the battle of darkness and light
by Fightstars
Summary: Jak is now leader of Haven, many things have been put right in the city, but the metalheads still survive like cockroaches in the east. Two figures appear at the catacombs, but there are more pressing matters too. J&K A&T D&T S&OC OC&OC COMPLETE!
1. Chapter 1:the sighting

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: this is my first fanfic so go easy on the flames, OK?

THE BATTLE OF DARKNESS AND LIGHT

chapter 1:the sighting

Jak and Keira trudged through the mesh of human and metal-head corpses, they were both appalled by the sheer scale of the destruction. It was four hours after the final leg of the battle had ended with the destruction of the warp gates from the Hora Dailan (A/N the hora Dailan is the metal head land, it means, horror land in precurian), but there were still a few stray metal-heads that had survived the short purging, which was why Jak had been sent out to kill them, naturally Keira had wanted to come along, the two had of course been inseperable for the last few weeks. They were in the city centre of Shassa city, a place that had never seen the wrath of the metal-heads, and they were unprepared, if haven hadn't sent troops to aid their ally, no one would have been spared. And they were just about to head back before spotting a small group of human survivors under a canopy of rubble.

"Help", they cried,"We're over here, please help us, the dark creatures killed them, they killed them all, we're the last ones left.

jak, not being one to let innocents die, leapt into action, the building was coming down fast, it'd soon crush the group.

"Keira, radio Torn that we've got some refugees for Haven coming through, and we need lifting equipment," bellowed jak through his comm unit,"And by the sound of that howl, we may have potential MH units on the way, SHIT HERE THEY COME."

He could see the dark animals moving in the darkness, they could smell the blood of the survivors on the wind, and they were hungry. They moved around the unstable building containing the people, slowly circling it as if the knew Jak would never make it in time, one of them, a wolf metal-head, moved in towards the entrance with almost intentional casualness, and received a peacemaker blast up the backside from Jak's morph gun as a reward, some of the large four legged ones were beginning to figure out that the building could give up the ghost at any moment, and were starting to poke around at the supports of the upper rooms. Jak sprinted the last few metres before whipping out the needle lazer and letting rip, he caught the first few creatures in mid-air as the y leapt at him, the small cluster of scorpion metal-heads were blasted apart by the arc weilder, and as he pounced on the four legged ones, changing to dark Jak in the air, he caught something out of the corner of his eye, a strange light coming from the north, the same direction as Haven, he ignored it as he hit the first one though, the dark lightning spreading over its body as Dark injected his laws into the hard armour, he destroyed one after another in this same way in the space of about ten seconds, when he slammed into the last one, the entire bottom half was simply ripped away from the body, in the things extreme pain, some chemical reaction inside its body set off the gun on its arm, the pellets of darkness spreading in a wide arc across the city street, and through some combination of unfortunate circumstances, one of them clipped the support cable of one of the pillars holding up the upper floors, sending ten tonnes of steel and rock tumbling down of the terrified men and women, their screams were lost to all but dead ears, there was nothing anyone could do.

It was at that moment that Keira arrived with a transport ship and troops, just in time to see a lone hand pocking out of the pile, it stuggled for a second, then went limp, she nearly broke down there and then, but she told herself, "No, i musn't cry now, if people see a potential queen of Haven despairing they may lose hope". So she composed herself and approached Jak warily, giving him time to revert back to his human form, she knew he could sometimes not control his darker side when he was angry, and he was always angry when his people died , he always blamed himself when he couldn't save people, he thought it was his fault.

"What happened Jak," said Keira softly,"I thought the building was stable for the moment."

"It was, metal-heads got here first, I could have saved them, but I was too slow, those bastards in armour shot the pillars out, the whole top floor fell on them...I couldn't even save one, not even one."

Keira sighed exasperatedly, "Come on, lets go home, we need to figure out how they got here, and how they managed to get warp gates over the Cataenas ocean without us picking up their fliers on radar."

The two climbed back into the transport and gave the order to take off, the ships on-board computer flashed green, a mechanical female voice said, "Flight plan confirmed, destination: Freedom Tower, Haven city, passengers: King Jak Mar of Haven city, Keira Hagai of Haven city,Governer Ashelin Praxis of Haven city, pilot rosh of Haven city, and co-pilot Barnen of Haven city."

Ashelin? You in there!" Called Jak into the cockpit.

"Yeah Jak, i was called in by Commander Kun to escort you, he happened to be looking at the moniters in Shassa central when he saw a large flare up of dark eco around the place where you went looking, he figured it was you turning Dark, so he sent me to make sure you didn't need support."

"Never misses a trick that one," said Keira amusedly, " He'll go far that one."

Ashelin climbed through past the co-pilot into the passenger area in order to talk to the two directly, "Yeah, he's already up for promotion onto the high council, I've a feeling he'll turn it down though, he likes action too much to give it up for nothing but a comfy chair and a safe position to watch people die from."

"At least this one's better than the last lot that were placed in charge, now that they're being chosen by someone COMPETENT." Invoiced Jak with a glare at the Governer.

"Well how was I to know that six of them were Praxis loyalists, they seemed level enough in the interviews," She said indignantly, "And besides, it all turned out for the best in the end, what we should be discussing is what the hell happened out there, first Keira turns up at the base saying something about survivors and metal-heads, then when we get there, all we see is a pile of rubble and some dead metal-monkeys."

Keira shot daggers of ice at Ashelin and told her everytning that happened, "And then the metal-heads b-broke the cables a-and the whole thing came crashing d-d-own on them." She finished with some difficulty, wiping silent tears from her cheeks, Jak looked sympathetic, Ashelin just looked disgusted and muttered a sentence containing the word "pathetic".

Jak yanked her arm and dragged her into another section of the flying craft, he was clearly very angry at the treatment of his girlfriend.

"AND WHAT MAY I ASK WAS THAT ALL ABOUT!" He thundered once the soundproof glass was closed.

"Well just look at her," said the woman calmly, " Shes meant to be the future queen and shes acting like a baby, shes your only real weakness Jak, if any of Havens enemies found out how much you care for her, they could very easily use it against you."

"OH AND YOU THINK MAKING FUN OF HER IS GOING TO CHANGE HOW I FEEL ABOUT HER DO YOU, DO YOU THINK ANY OF US ARE SAFE WHILE THOSE CREATURES STILL LIVE, I CAN'T PROTECT EVERYONE, BUT I AM CERTAINLY ABLE OF TAKING CARE OF THE ONE I LOVE! IF YO...

But he wasn't able to finish as the ship gave a violent jolt, the whole cabin seemed to move like a zoomer, Jak staggered back through the door and into the cockpit, just in time to watch a thin spine covered hand rip the pilot and co-pilot out of the ship and throw them bodily out onto the cold hard ground that was steadily rushing up to meet the three people aboard the transport as well, Jak quickly flicked the switch marked 'AUTO PILOT', and seized the arm still dangling from above the top of the side door and pulled hard. He met more resistance than expected, he actually had to try to get the thing to give up whatever purchace it had on the roof and swing down to meet the end of the heros boot, Jak caught a fleeting glimpse of it before it slammed into the concrete, it was black and purple all over its body, it had long pointed spines running up and down its body, and what looked like greyish boils on its stomach, he couldn't help feeling he had seen it somewhere before, somewhere in the distant past, somewhere he had been before.

Two solitary figures crawled up from the ruins of the old palace, they could both see a new structure high above them, built by Haven over the exact location of the catacombs to hide them from prying eyes, neither could fully understand how the tower got there, or even how long they had been down there, but they were obviously ancient beings, the dark eco below had warped their bodys beyond repair, they might once have been human, but not anymore.

"Ahhh my sister, we are at last free from the imprisonment of the darkness below, more powerful than ever before." Said the first wheezingly.

Yes, now that we have returned, we shall seek that basard hero that brought us down before and the world of the green sun will once again know the terror of Gol and Maia.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: alright thats the storyline set, and just to clarify Gol and Maia wont be appearing again until the sequel, so just hold onto your hats, i'm going for a whole series here.


	2. Chapter 2:the island

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: i hope you all enjoyed my last chapter and all the reviews make me fell like carrying on early.

chapter 2: the island

Torn, Ashelin, Keira, and Jak were all gathered in the control pinnacle of freedom tower, the glistening blue spire was the perfect visualisation of the new Haven city, ever reaching to new hieghts of freedom and justice, if the Baron had been there he probably would have killed himself at the sight of all the _justice_ that was happening, most of the Freedom League was now used just as help to get the people of Shassa back on their feet, since Shassa had never been invaded by the metal-heads, and the only other country touching it was Mamoron, their greatest ally, the Sfassans never saw the need of walls, they soon learned different, Havens main prioritys were, 1)protecting Shassa, 2)investigating the roumors that another country was about to join the marauders in their never-ending fight against reason, and 3)exploration, there is still uncharted land out there.

Torn was the first to break the akward silence between the two couples, "So was there anyone worth saving out in the wasteland Jak, reports say that there was movement out there."

Jak shook his head,"No, theres no one out there but lurkers, we've been negotiating with their leaders, and they're sending an ambassodor to work out the technicalities of the treaty, they're still not too happy with Haven because of the whole 'slave' thing," said Jak witheringly, he had already tol 3 officials, 2 ministers, 4 members of the council, 2 commanders and the town drunk who could well have been a descendant of boggy Billy.

"Well what about when you and Keira here went out to east of Sejun(pronounced sayun), did you find any land out there, we need more land to fill, more and more of the eastern land is being sucked dry of eco, and we can't afford to fall behind the Jonses."

Jak looked over at Keira, they both knew very well that there was land out there but the inhabitants of Draes didn't want to be identified, because they were convinced that word would eventually lead back to the metal-heads, and if that happened then they're relative peace would be destroyed, so Keira simply said, "We saw nothing but a few rocks pocking up, nothing habitable, anyway, i thought there were still plenty of drilling platforms in the Cataenas ocean, arn't they enough."

"They dont survive the eco storms long enough to get anything substantial out of the water, sometimes I think the metal-heads must control those things, now what about the ragles, have they agreed to your conditions, we need more air units than just Hellcats, we need something with capability of flying without fuel, and with much much MUCH more steering power."

"The Old Ragle has agreed on one condition."

"And whats that," queried Ashelin.

"That he and his people are allowed the Spargus wasteland as nesting grounds," replied Jak, and braced himself for the explosion from Torn, he wasn't disappointed.

"WHAT! THATS PREPOSTEROUS, FOR ONE WE CAN'T SPEAK FOR SPARGUS, TWO THOSE CLIFFS ARE ALLOCATED TO THE LURKERS, AND FOR THREE, THEY'RE BLOODY ANIMALS!

Before he could go on and work up a good head of steam Keira cut him off short,"For one we have already asked Sig and he has agreed heartily,"she said quickly, not letting Torn get a word in edgewise,"For two the lurkers only use the caves and the old marauder fortress, and for three they are every bit as smart as a human and should be treated as such."

Torn struggled and stuttered to find a flaw in her logic, but eventually gave up and walked away, too annoyed to grill Jak for answers anymore, but he didn't get further than the door as it burst open and hit him painfully on the nose, the private standing there nearly shat himself at the look on Torns face, "C-c ommand-der T-t-t-torn, w--we n-n-n-n-..."

"WHAT IS IT MAN, SPIT IT OUT!"

"Theres a ship arriving in port, theres only one man left, and a few bodies, hes barely alive, he wants to speak to you, his highness, the Governer, and the Lady Keira s-sir."

Without even saying a word Jak swept out his customised JET-board, swung Keira up onto the back, and sped off towards the harbour in turbo mode, Keira had never experienced a ride on Jaks JET-board before, and all she knew about them was that the people that came out of it unscathed were usually the unlucky ones, cos if you didn't get hurt then the chances were that you came out of it a nervous wreck, now she knew why.

When they arrived at the harbour the ship _Destiny _was waiting for them, the two sped up the gangway and into the bridge.

The entire ship was covered in dark eco stains, usually the sign the she had hit a storm, but that couldn't have happened here, Jak thought, no ship has ever survived a storm without having to be pulled off the ocean floor.

"They must have travelled too far east," whispered Keira at the sight of the mangled bodies that had obviously been scorched by eco.

"Negative miss, they're ship was headed west, and the cruiser led them in from the west, the driver and the ship were floating just off Kras, they citizens recognised the Haven insignia and got a cruiser to tow her here."

Both Keira and Jak turned to see commander Kun walking towards them, his pitch black sleeked down at the front, perfect helmet hair, thought Jak, Keira and Jak both liked Kun a lot, not just because he had saved they're asses during the driving of the marauders from the wasteland, but because they both saw a loyalty and honesty in his eyes and his manner, and Jak liked him because he was the only person who hadn't tried to make a move on Keira before finding out she was engaged.

"Hi Kun, so whats the story with the blackened corpses if it wasn't a storm then, the only reason I can think of is if they managed to find Dei Dailan Ok Eco(A/N this translates as, the land of eco, and is where eco is too rich for anyone but Jak to enter) and went ashore without realising where they were."

"I think you should listen to the survivors story before he cops it too, they took him to Haven medical because of his bad case of eco poisoning, but there was nothing they could do."

When they arrived at Haven medical everyone sort of cowered away from Jak as he passed by, he had unintentionally gained a reputation as an angry destructive people hater, and he was doing his best to live it down by being as kind as possible. They reached the eco poisoning ward too late, the patient had died not minutes beforehand, "Did you hear his story first, "said Kun to the doctor.

"Yes i did, he said that he and his crew were sailing west in search of more eco mines, they ran aground at an unknown location, they could see a great structure on the cliff above they're ship, and some of them wanted to investigate it, but he and three others argued against in, eventually the rest of them left to enter the craft, they didn't come back for hours do the ones who had stayed went looking, they came to an opening in the wall and saw shapes moving in the darkness, the other two thought it was they're comrades and went in a little bit, but before they got very far there was an explosion of eco, and the men got blasted out, they crawled back to their ship, pursued by dark creatures, the other two died on the journey back, thats all he said."

that simple horror story meant nothing to the rest, but everything to Jak, he knew what it was, the dark maker ship had survived the crash.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:i hope you enjoyed that little twist, keep the reviews coming, and rememberi officially have a copyright on Kun, and any other characters that i will introduce in the future.


	3. Chapter 3: the furball is in da house

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:now then, I still havn't got any reviews, so if theres someone out there reading this, HELP! Now if anyone like marysuedestroyer or eyeslikesilk are trying to put me down, then fuck off, if you're only on this site to make other peoples stories fail then theres no point coming on is there.

CHAPTER THREE:THE FURBALL IS IN DA HOUSE

After Jak's learning of the fact that the DM ship was still running, and a brief freak-out by most of the goverment, he began to calm down, after all, the rest of the dark walkers were never awakened, so it was logical that they were still in cryo-sleep, and the chances that one of them had been woken up by the crash were a million to one, weren't they?

Jak trudged down the streets of new Haven, on his way to the former FL HQ, after it had been liberated, the city had begun to flourish once more, in the same way that it had when Damas was in charge, the old metal head nest had been eradicated, although people had decided to keep the canal in, and the entire stadium section had been converted from ruins to the biggest racetrack in Jak's world. The whole of the canal section was designed now to mimic some of the worlds fastest and toughest terrain. At the start of the track was the volcano section, with real lava. Then the landscape changed to the icy tundra of the marauders country, where racers often slid off and blew up against the wall. And finally some smart person had thought of the idea to make a challenge track at the end of the metal head nest, with mock metal heads to shoot, the more points the player stacked up by killing creatures, the lower his time would be. But that wasn't all, there were a vast number of side tracks and stadiums for deathmatches, turbo races, meelees, and of course, Jak had won them all with great ease.

the HQ itself had been upgraded when Freedom Tower was built as a replacement, it had been altered to be the landing pad for helcats and lurker balloons, Jak was on his way there to meet the lurker ambassodor as he arrived, Jak had always got on with the lurkers(when they weren't trying to kill him), because he respected them for their fighting skills, and also because he had liked Brutter before he had had to return to his people for political matters of state, Keira, Ashelin and Torn were already there waiting for him when he arrived.

"You're just in time Jak," rasped Torn in his gravely voice, "The wall turrets say the balloon passed about five minutes ago," he turned upwards toward the gaurd stationed at the top of the tall funnel, and yelled,"OPEN THE HATCHES!."

The gaurd did so, and in the nick of time, the large grey structure was making its slow descent in in a matter of seconds, it landed somewhat haphazardly, as if it was steered by hands more suited to holding battle-axes, but finally made it down safely, the door swung open, and out stepped, to Jak's surprise, Brutter!

"Jak hero, it good to see you again," squeakd the lurker in his funny up-and-down voice not really suited to one his size, and then continued,"Where is little orangy-warrior, Brutter has missed him so much since going back to lurker tribes."

"Daxter's on his honeymoon with Tess, he won't be back for a few days," explained Jak.

"That reminds me, where did they go, for it," piped up Keira.

"They went to Kras."

"But I thought Daxter was terrified of all the gangsters there."

"He was and still is, it was Tess's idea, she was so impressed with all Daxter's stories about how he took onn sooo many ganglords that she wanted to visit there herself, and to see her Daxie-poo in action of course"

"Oooooohhhhhh dear," giggled Keira, "Daxter must have wet himself at the thought of it."

But a small high-pitched voice coming from the door made them stop and all turn around, "All right all right, you can stop making jokes and comments now, COS THE DAXTERNATOR IS IN DA HOUSE!

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:so what did you all think, I decided i had to bring Daxter in earlier than scheduled, cos you can't really have Jak without Daxter, so now you can all be happy and review, cos look, dangles plot twist in front of readers you want this twist, nice juicy twist, huh? you do, you do, well tough you'll have to review and read the next chapter, HAH!and I'm very sorry about the length, but I'm doing a big battle scene in ch 5 so that'll be much longer.


	4. Chapter 4:the sword of freedom

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:let me first assure you that i will be making this chapter a lot longer, i hope i didn't lose any readers in the last chapter bacause of its length, so here goes nothing.

**CHAPTER 4:THE SWORD OF FREEDOM**

Jak strode into Haven library and found Samos straddled over a ladder, he didn't seem to notice that they had arrived, naturally Daxter saw this as an opportunity to piss the old man off, so he dropped off Jak's shoulder and went mission-impossible-style, slinking, around and jumping behind bookstands and shelves towards the section where the old sage was working, humming the MI tune under his breath as he went. He skinned up the ladder to just behind the green eco lover, reared up his arms and put onhis scariest face and...

And then Samos spun round and flew off the ladder and floated just a few metres away, this caused Daxter to fall off the step in fright and land flat on his back in front of Jak, then Samos zoomed down horizontally and shouted in Daxters face.

"YOU CAN'T SNEAK UP ON A SAGE YOU LUMP OF FUR, MY BIRD SAW YOU COMING AGES AGON, AND I SMELT YOU COMING LONG BEFORE THAT, AND YOU'RE NOT EXACTLY QUIET ARE YOU, I CAN HEAR THE FLEAS RUSTLING IN YOU FUR MILES AWAY!"

"FLEAS! Idon't have fleas," protested Daxter before scratching his neck with his foot.

"Now Jak," I've been meaning to talk to you about something dreadfully important, in allthe statues I've seen of Mar, he's always shown holding a sword, a particular sword, so I came here to delve into it a bit more, records say that the blade was forged by Mar himself, and named _The Sword Of Freedom _by the people, this book, _The Memoirs Of A Hero_, tells us that when Mar rode out on his last journey, that he never returned from, he left the sword in the care of the three remaining sages, who were still alive at the time, and told them to place it in the depths of the forbidden temple, and to gaurd it until his heir came to claim it, and thats you Jak."

"So what do I need to know, I imagine the way to get to it is death-defying at best." Said Jak, with a sly smile at Daxter, who gave a nervous gulp and gnerally looked terrified.

"Well the _Archive Of The Temple_ says that each sage placed his or her own test to guard it, and these tests would have to be so hard that only the true heir could beat them. The red sage placed a test of strength, no problem, the yellow placed a test of aim, again you can do it, the blue sage placed a test of guile, may be a bit of a problem, the light sage, who you have never met, placed a test of flying skills, which you can do with your light powers, and finally, of course i imagine that they had to replace Gol, so I think the dark eco sage will have placed something too, but I'm not sure what that one could be, and I have no doubt that it will be the hardest. And one more thing, the sages never returned from the temple, so theres a high chance that even they couldn't beat their own tests, so watch out, AND HOP TO IT."

2 hours later

Jak arrived at the entrance to the lower levels of the temple in relative health, despit a short run in with a metal-head at the exit to the city, but his fun was spoiled by a show off turret manner who foolishly tried to impress Jak by attempting to hit the metal-head from over a kilometer away, instead all he did was give Daxter a hole in his new trousers and get a nasty glare from Jak before being sacked by commander Kun, who just happened to be passing when he saw the incident, aafter that little slip-up Daxter decided it would be better if he just slept through this escapade, and slid into Jak's backpack and set up position with his foot jammed into the hero's spine, and got a sharp prod in return. The young boy made his way through Haven forest to the particular rock that Samos had told him to look for and recited the motto of the house of Mar, _find balance and you shall be a hero,_ and cut his arm with a sharp stick, letting the blood drip onto the stone, after a few seconds the stone began to hum, then precursor marks appeared on it, they read, _welcome heir of Mar, the ecos await you, _"The ecos await you, what could that mean?" Asked Jak, but got nothing but snores in return."Aaahhhh well, off we go into the deep dark dangerous pit then."

1hour later

Jak had been walking for ages down endless corridors, and had still not seen anything significant, he was walking down a staight passage, having left the large junctions behind long ago, he couldn't see any more than a few feet in front of him, the days when the precursor metal around him shimmered and shone were long gone. He had become light Jak for a short time, but had decided to preserve his enery for the light sages test, he came very abruptly to a dead end, he looked back, but was sure he had followed the old mans instructions to the letter, it was then that he noticed the large hole in the door, it was just large enough to fit his hand through, he saw sign of red eco above it, a larg muscly arm, and realised that this must be the red sages test, he could think of nothing else to do, so he put his arm gingerly inside the opening, and braced himself. He started to feel a touch from the other side, fingers, a hand, and then it transfered toa strange machine of some sort, he felt mechanical claws clamp him, and then searing pain, the thing on the other side was attempting to yank him through the hole, he knew he wouldn't survive it, so he began to pull back, not too hard, for he knew that the test would get harder and he would have to increase the effort, he tugged at it without rythym, trying to throw the ...whatever it was, off balance, it seemed to work, but only for a second, the claw tightened its grip, and started to drag Jak closer, his shoulder was almost touching the door, he knew that if he went in too far then he wouldn't be able to gain back the ground, so he exerted all his strength into one last pull. He tugged harder, harder, he could just see out of his clenched eyes that the door was beggining to show faint lines, like the segments of an orange, he figured out that at some point the door would split open and he would be able to continue, so he went for the last assault, he could feel the claw loosening its grip, just a little further. CRACK! The metal shattered and light flooded the halway, and Jak stared in awe at who was on the other side.

It was the red sage, Hukken, "Wh-wh-ho-wha-HOW!" spluttered Jak, Everyone thought the old sages had died down here, and even if they hadn't, no one could have lived that long.

The sage chuckled,"Well done, but we've no time for questions now, Bockshut is expecting you, and we've been waiting for two hundred years, he doesn't like waiting, he'll be in a terrible mood, off you go my boy."

half an hour later( you may notice I'm cutting out all the walking Jak does, its just common sense.)

Jak was expecting another door, what he got was quite different, he got a tall part of the corridor, it went from about seven feet tall, then abruptly to fifty. He could see holes on either wall that were obviously for his targets to come out of, he looked up to a small booth at the other end that contained Bockshut, the yellow sage, he leant down to a microphone and said in his hillbilly voice, "Alright then boy, get ready to shoot, here come your targets, nnnnnnnow!"

Strange creatures that seemed to be made of yellow eco shot out of the holes and whizzed through the air, shooting fireballs left right and centre, Jak dodged two particularly nasty ones and whipped out the beam reflexor, he aimed at the wall just in front of him and clipped off five shots in sucsession, letting the beams of light bounce arond the walls destroying sixteen different creatures and transforming them into pools of eco, he shot of another ten at the corner of the chamber and the first five sped off towards a large cluster of monsters standing on the ground, a chain recation happened when the first one hit the leader, its explosion causing the rest of the group to shatter as well, leaving the remaining four shots to bounce away and go straight through another six yellow ecos. Jak looked up to see a score board with 5000, as the target, and 3265 as his current points total, he was clocking up five points for each creature destroyed, but it wasn't enough, he needed more points to beat the clock, time was ticking. He pulled out an upgrade and strapped it to the front of his morph gun, and fired one shot, a small spinning disc erupted from his barrel into the air, after a milisecond it beagan shooting out small pellet wrapped in yellow eco, it took a few minutes for the turret to run out of ammo, and by that time Jak had 4500 points, but only ten seconds left. He spotted a tiny yellow pack just below the roof, he recognised it at once as an eco bomb, he only had one shot, he pulled out the peace makewr and whipped it up, aimed carefully, and fired. It was a dead hit, a mushroom cloud spread out to fill the whole room, engulfing Jak just seconds after he turned on his light sheild. As the cloud began to clear, Jak lowered his sheild, and looked tentativly up at his score, it was over 10 000.

The yellow sage stepped out of his booth and called to Jak, "Well done m'boy, took me three shots to master that, you're a great aim," he sniffed,"Say where's that little muskrat, I never did get a chance to say goodbye to him."

"He's asleep in his bag," answered Jak, though he could feel the ottsel shivering at the sound of the sound of the voice of the man who had wanted to turn him into muskrat stew.

"Shame, well go on ahead boy, Mosen's waitin' for ya."

another half hour later

Jak ws entering another chamber, after they had left the yellow sages test Daxter had figured that there was no point in pretending to be asleep anymore if that racket was going to be going on more than ever, so he had hopped up to Jak's shoulder again and had been nattering about how much he hated the yellow sage for the last fifteen minute of the leg. Jak looked to the centre of the room where there was a challenge awaiting him, it was a fairly simple looking challenge, there were ten circles with stars and handles on them and ten holes of different sizes, Jak was just about to put one in before he heard the blue sages high pitched voice.

"Hold on there Jak, you've gotta push the big, red, shiny button first."

Jak did and the circles began to expand and contract in and out, he realised that ift wasn't going to be as easy as he thought,if he put the circle in at the wrong time, then his hand could be trapped, and he doubted that the blue sage would help him out, he first got the rythym of the opening and closing, making sure he knew when it would be wider or smaller, he got the first one in with considerable difficulty, he almost put it in too far and let himself get stuck, but he remained calm and simply let the hole contract again, when it held the circle firm it stopped moving. The second one was bigger, so he had less time to get it in, and more chance of getting caught, he let it open as wide as possible, then shoved the peice in viciously, he just managed it. The next seven followed in a similar fashion, and he slowly became aware that the holes were speeding up with each one he got in, so the last one was the hardest of all, the hole was moving so fast Jak could barely keep track, he decided to slowly edge it in, he began to lower the peic, closer and closer to the speedy opening, three inches, two inches, one inch , he closed hiseyes, seeing it wouldn't make a difference anyway, he eased it gently in, it could hit any moment. SHUNK! Heopened his eyes slightly. Both he and Daxter sighed, the last peice of the puzzle was wedged safely in the hole, he had done it.

A large circly opened in the roof and the blue sage sped down on an eco lifter, and said,"You have done brilliantly Jak, my expectations of you have greatly improved since our last meeting, by defeating this carniverous machine, you have proven yourself worthy to weild the shining blade of Mar."

"HEY! What about me." Shouted Daxter.

"You were asleep on this great hero's shoulder, so you get zip." Said a fourth voice.

A great being of light not unlike light Jak floated down to meet them. "Greetings Jak, I am Shorine, the light eco sage, I shall take you to your next task. Follow me. Your pet may come with you if he wishes, but tell him, in whatever language he speaks, that there will be many dangers in both mine and Karena's tests."

"PET! And wait a minute, the dark eco sage is a GIRL?"

"Yes, now please take on your lighter form and follow me, so your task may begin."

"What is my task.?"

"To beat me in a sky race to the next task."

So Jak turned into L.Jak, the blue sage counted down, and they were off. There was a bridge across the walls, Jak ducked under it, the entire course was filled with obstacles by the looks of it. He swerved to avoid pillars and other things. He was a few metres behind the sage, but not for long, he dropped low to the ground. He could see a ramp coming up with lightning signs on it, he flew just inches from the ground and dragged his fingers in the thigk layer of blue eco coating the ground, and sped off at double speed. The light sage lokked down and saw Jak come flying past her, he was several yards ahead now, and was coming up to another obstacle course, the falling rocks. Boulders dropped from the ceiling, he ducked and weaved and zig-zagged to avoid them, he could see the finish line, if he could only stay in the lead for one more second. But then he heard a screambehind him. He spun round and saw the light sage fall to the floor, she had been clipped by a rock and her old form wasn't able to withstand the force. He looked back to the finish, it was no contest, he whirled round and cartwheeled to her body, the rocks were still falling, and eventually one would fall on her. His arm grabbed her under the arms, and hoisted her onto his back, he reverted back to normal, because he couldn't flap his wings with a body on his back, and ran for safety, he had to roll and drag the body the last few feet, as a peice of rock had spun off when a boulder hit the ground and knocked her off, he managed to get her across the line, and pressed the button for the rocks to stop.

"Uhuuuhh...what happened, did I fall, AAHH the rocks," she sat up, thinking she was still in the falling range, but then saw that the rocks had stopped, and noticed Jak kneeling a little away.

"You almost didn't make it, I had to go Back for you, meaning I failed the challenge." Whispered Jak..

"Oh do you really think I'm going to let the man who saved me lose the challenge just because he was decent enough to save my life instead, not likely, you have completed your challenge, and you may progress in your own time."

"Good I need to rest after using up so much light eco, have to let it replenish itself."

"Good." Said the red sage, who had just arrived with the blue and yellow."You can fill us in on what we've missed.

"Well the metal-head leader was killed by me, the dark planet biulder that the dark makers sent to destroy the planet was destroyed, by me, and the Krew and Mizo crime families were brought out of power by, guess who, and the precursors payed us a visit a bout a year and a half ago."

"WHAT!" All the sages chorused. "The great precursors have returned, the dark makers defeated, THE METAL-HEAD LEADER KILLED BY A BOY AND HIS MUSKRAT?" sAID THE YELLOW SAGE.

"Yep, thats about the size of it, you can get the story in more detail when you get out, now I'm gonna go on, I'm feeling better, see you on the other side."

you know the drill by know

Jak entered a grand room covered in blues and yellows and reds and purples and light eco blues, and in the centre was a tall pedestal, and placed in the middle, sword in the stone style, was _The Sword Of Freedom_. He walked towards it and climbed the steps to the great blade before a young and beautiful girl fell down from the roof and stopped him.

"So I take it you're Karena." Jak said respectfully.

"Yess, and you are the revered hero Jak. The other sages have called me through the power of eco and told me what you have done. It is a great honor to meet the man who destroyed the dark ones, I am in your service, but first you must prove yourself once more.You have shown us that you are indeed worthy to weild the blade of Mar, but now we must see that you _can._

So she pulled the sword out of its hold and handed it to him, before drawing her own sword and shouting, "EN GARDE."

Jak drew into a fighters stance, the two circled each other first, points forward, eyes fixed on the others weapon, waiting for any sign of movement. Jak knew he must be careful, she had had centuries to practice for his arrival, and he was a novice with a sword, but strangely, the handle felt at home in his hands, as if he had been a swordsman all his life.

The first blood(figuratively)went to Jak, he ran in to the centre and jabbed hard at Karena's stomach. She was so surprised by such a vicious attack so early in the match that she didn't have time to block, her armour held, but she was winded. She staggered for a moment, then regained herself, and pirroeted around, spinning her sword above her head,. But her onslaught was block by Jak, he then followed up with a thrusy, but she parried, the armoured sage then swung low at his feet, trying to trip him, Jak jumped to avoid the blow and slammed the flat of his blade down on her back and knocked her limply to the floor, and that was all it took, ahe held up her hand in the precursor universal sign for surrender.

"I think I need more practice to beat a hero, the blade is yours to keep, do with it what you will, but use it only for the goodof the people."

Jak looked at the sword properly for the first time, it was a work of art, there was precursor metal woven into the blade, making it lighter, the blade itself was pure first grade steel, it had etchings in the hilt that from what Jak could make out, meant that the sword would channel whatever eco the holder was channeling, but in the centre were the words that meant the most to Jak,_ balance will awaken the power,_ so Jak, knowing what it meant, summoned both the dark and light powers inside him, and let the powers of the two most powerful ecos engulf him. He could see the etchings on the blade begin to glow with dark fire, and then the sword burst into life, both dark and light exploding from the metal, the the colours pouring out of the windows of the temple, the people of Haven woke up in their beds, and smiled.


	5. Chapter 5:the alliance

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:hello people, I'm back with chapter 5, you may notice that I made up the names of the sages in the last CH, and I would like to point out that I do not own J&D, I was just extrapolating for the sake of the story, now on with the show.

**CHAPTER 5: THE ALLIANCE**

After the return of _The Swird Of Freedom _to Haven city the overall morale of the Havinians and the Shassan refugees was boosted considerably, even the news couldn't the the marauders of Manaras were planning to attack Spargusdampen the people's spirits,. Well...the civilians that is, behind closed doors Havens goverment was in a frenzied rush to help their old allies, most people thought that after Erol was defeated Haven and Spargus would be enemies, but the Spargians were smart enough to know that it wasn't Haven that threw them out, only Praxis.

Jak was on his way to Kras to ask someone who owed him a favour for support, but it wasn't going to be easy, first he had to get past the guards, this particular person wasn't too keen on actually returning the favour, thats right, you guessed it, Rayn.

She had taken up stead in a small but wealthy part of the city aptly named, _Racers Town_. Now that she controlled the Krew faminly business and the Mizo business she had considerable influence over the other gangs, and had already "convinced" three other "legitimate" businesses to join with hers to make a super gang, Jak wanted her on his side bacause in total she controlled about 70 percent of the city, and that was about 3.2 million people, not someone you want looking at you down a pair of barrels in other words.

He had seen a small gap in her security at the east wall of her stronghold, a fifty foot wall with no guard placed on it, he was actually quite impressed, with her ingenuity, the only reason he could get in is she wasn't expecting someone who could fly to come after her. He slowly emerged from the shadows, making sure he was well inside the perimiter before he turned light, any sudden upsurge of eco might show up on her scanners. He drew his wings out and flaped hard to catch the updrafts and then sped up the wal only a few centimetres away from it, he could see the alarm that he had spotted before, he had to destroy it at the precice second he wanted, just before he came into view of the infrared, he couldn't pull out a gun now, it would alter his aerodynamice too much, he had to use his good old fists, they were efficient enough, they had got him past a whole lurker army before guns were invented, he could do it. The choke point was coming up, he got into position, it was only a metre away, NOW! The box crumbled into peices and fell to the ground, no alarm went off, he was safe.

Inside the building, Rayn was uneasy, ahe had heard a strange sond a crash of something breaking, now she swore she could hear rattling in the airducts, none of her guards could hear anything above a shout because of all the training with percussion granades. CLANG! That was it, now she definately heard something, her men around her heard it too, someone was in the control room messing with the controls, her entire team raced there with her, if she got there before the lights went out she could avert the crisis, she entered the room at a sprint, and saw that little runt Daxter chewing on the wires, he grinned at her.

"Don't blame me, IIIIIII didn't do it." He yammered, before snapping the wire in his mouth and cutting the lights, then jumping back into the duct above him, his maniacal laugh sending shivers down the trained soldiers backs.

"Miss Rayn, said one of her seargents, "You should go to your quarters, we can hold the fort at base, hopefully you'll be safe there."

Rayn sighed and resigned herself to the fact that all her men were as good as dead and she was in Jak's hands already, at least she could wait it out a bit longer a her own room, she ran down the dark corridors to her quarters, bursting through the door and loocking it, backing away from the tempered steel. And then she heard a familiar voice.

"I figured this was your room, very nice, you always did want the special treatment."

:And what was I supposed to do, entrust my life to a pair of bungling morons, I don't trust anyone, and especially not friends, the only person I trusted was Mizo, you can always count on your enemies to do exactly what you expect them to do, and thats why I've been preparing for this day." The whole time she had been speaking she had been slipping her hand down to her gun holster, hopefully Jak hadn't noticed . She felt for the leather strap of the holster,it was empty.

"Looking for this? Jak said, she spun around, to find Jak with a sword at her throat, twirling a gun on his index finger.

"Now lets do this right, you give me military support for the battle against the marauders, I let you live, and we both gain a powerful ally, clear."

She considered it, but in hindsight she didn't have much choice," Deal."

"Good." He muttered, and then jumped into a glowing hole in the roof, the lights came back on. A corporal came to the door, and shouted.

"Miss, we've rerouted power to the lights, we can't see the bastard on screen, he must have not fancied tangling with us."

"Get our troops up, all the most experienced racers are to soup up their cars, I want Shiv, Edgie, Cutter, UR86 and Razer to get those beasts up and running, we leave tomorrow for the oasis at Spargus, we're giving our dupport to King Jak of Haven, and King Sig of Spargus."

"B-but miss." Stuttered the obviously inexperienced corporal.

"Look, do you want to know what happened to the last person who presumed to question my orders.

"W-what?"

"I ran him over." that seemed to do it, the corporal ran to tell the news to his superiors to try and get back in her good books. The young ganglord looked in the mirror, sometimes she thought she was too young for this lark, then she took a lie down till it wore off.

the next morning at the oasis

The army Jak had massed numbered over 6.5 mllion people, the refugees from Shassa had shown their gratitude and pledged the entire compliment of their forces, every man women and child had walked out of Spargus in the night with a gun in their hand, Kras city government had sent 500 000 troops to the battle, but they were beaten to the post by Rayn, who had brought 2, 000, 000 soldiers and gang members to the scene, and Haven itself had brought 1 million FL troopers, 200 helcats, and 500 of the old KG tanks and bomb bots . Intelligence in Jaina and Halas had seen 10, 000, 000 marauders leave the capital cities and set sail for the wasteland, they had with them a great flat walker that simply rolled into the sea with wheels on it, that would be their base of operatioons, Jak planned to wait for them to come to him, the thin bridge across from their base would force the marauders into a bottle-nack, Havens allied force had much more firepower than Manaras, since the precursors had never lived there, there was no technology to copy weapon designs from,all they hd was a few thousand primitive guns and next

to no armour. The wild men planned to simply charge in and hope to engulf the allies in sheer force of numbers, shows the difference eh?

The thre main sections of the force wer the Haven force, which included the government of Kras city's forces, the Spargus section, led by Sig of course, and the Kras section, since Jak still didn't trust Rayn, he had placed Kun at the head of this flank, the hellcats circled above, and the bomb-bots had been placed at the front to destroy the first wave of cars as they came across.

Jak had placed snipers at the top of the volcano beside the oasis to spot when the ships were coming, three hours into the wait he got the signal, and gave the order to start picking off the main cheiftains, a hail of orange fire spat out from the volcano once more as the snipers began their bombard, through his goggles Jak could see the ship clearly, and more importantly the number of bodies dropping from it.

"Alright Ashelin, get those systems online, we need the sheild wall to old against the main ships bombs!" He shouted through his comm, and looked to his side, Keira had, again, got the better of him and convinced him to let her come, she had been practising all week with the blaster and was getting pretty good. Samos and the other sages had a smallunit of monks in the centre of the force to cast eco spells and heal wounded, all in all, it was looing pretty good, but Jak's ears were tingling, a usual sign of trouble, he loked at Keira, he loved her so much, but she insisted on following him into the most dangerous situations, she herself was pretty frightened by the coming battle, she had been in round skirmishes before, but those were nothing compared to what was facing her, a full 10, 000, 000 men fully willing to kill her sailing right down towards her, she caught Jak looking at her and smiled, trying not to show how scared she was, by the look on his face, she failed miserably.

Now the first wave of troops were landing on the islands just off shore, unfortunately for them, the were now in peacemaker range, only six people in the whole army had peace makers, Jak, Sig, Kun, Torn, Rayn, and Keira, but they still managed to kill over a hundred enemies before they got their sheilds up, it was a good result, but now the bridge was starting to extend, the bomb-bots powered up, the bridge was almost down, in one more second they would be hit by the full force of an entire country, and the bridge dropped, letting loose the racers.

The first bot walked forward onto the bridge, the cars on the other side revved their engines, and shot out of the boats, they attempted to ram the bot, not knowing what it was, all they did was set it off, the first wave was wiped out in a second by only two bots, and the army had another twenty-three to go, the hellcats moved in and circled around the area where the most fighting was happening, the main ship had lowered two other smaller pamps on either side to let the infantry through, and were met by the Kras section in all its wheel-spinning clory, an entire regiment (in Haven terms, 10 000) was run over by the gangsters of the mob city, and Keira felt a slight pang in her side, as if something had been taken away from her, she bent over in pain, and Jak stopped firing in confusion, big mistake. He snapped up in time to stop a leaping marauder in mid air, just before it landed on Keira, who writhed in pain when he died, the battle was going well on the front lines, the marauders spirit had been broken sooner than expected, Guards had now taken to simply shooting the men out of their cars, getting in and turning their own machines back on them, the sight of their own cars speeding up to kill them made the marauders despair, they're own ships began to one by one surrender to the allied forces, many of them took onne look at the army marching over the ramp, and dhot their comrade in the back to how they wanted to join the Haven forces. The main experts on explosives, including Jinx, had begun to place TNT on board some of the main ship, they then moved some way back, and Jinx yelled, "SHOVE THIS UP YER ARSE CUNTS!" And blew up the ships. Keira screamed in pain, she could feel each individual persons death as it happened, she coulsn't stop it, Jak was becoming frantic, he called to Kun to stay by Keira and make sure she was OK, then raced to find Shorine.

He found her wedged in a romantic kiss with Samos, which Jak found particularly annoying, her was the father of the woman he had just seen half dying for no reason, and he was a few minutes away snogging someone.

"Samos! SAMOS! Snap out of it, listen you need to get back to Keira, shes been hurt somehow, I don't know how though, she just screams randomly, and I can't see any wounds, you two get back there, I'm needed on the front line." And he left before either of them could answer.

The main ship of the marauders was beggining to pull away, and had left the people still on the land to die, all the gangways had been pulled down, so there was no way anwone could get aboard anymore, Jak arrived just in time, he could see only one way to do it, he whipped out the peace maker, and attached a fitting to it he had sworn never to use again, but desperate times and all that, he told himself, a long purple rocket protruded from the end of the barrel, he carefully set aim for the main engine section of the ship, and fired. The missile sped through the air, time semed to slow, Keira, from her vantage point saw Jak and realised what he was doing, she hadn't the strength to drie out, there was nothing anyone could do, the nuke hit its target and blew the explosives, the chemical reaction of fire to fuel set a great blaze in the engine room that soon spread to the main oil tank, the entire ship blew up, none survived. Keira shuddered, and blacked out.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: I bet you all thought Iwas going to kill her didn't you, I must admit I thought about it, but how could I kill Jak's future wife when I havn't had a chance to do the wedding yet, and this makes for a better cliffhanger.


	6. Chapter 6: the light of life

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:well, here we are again, I hope you didn't stop reading when I used that cliffhanger, but I had to do it, its in my nature as an annoying idiot, but no more cliffhangers from now on, her we go, chapter 6.

CHAPTER 6: THE LIGHT OF LIFE

Keira's vision swam and swirled before her eyes, endless waves of colour washed over her. She could see nothing but shapes and shadows, as her consciousness became stronger, the shapes began to order themselves, she could now see something that looked remotely like Jak's face, and her daddy's a little further away, and an unfamiliar face. She thought who it could be, and she thought she could remember it now, like a dream of a dream, somewhere she had not been for years, somewhere...peaceful.

The people around her bed were talking, as she emerged from her stupor some more she could understand their words.

"So what _is_ wrong with her, she just fell, I can't think why." That was daddy, he seemed to be directing the question at the third person, who answered.

"I have looked through all the books on things like this that I could find, and they all seem to point to an ancient precursor legend, a theory that even the great ones forgot, they call it_ the light of life_. It means that when a person comes of age (A/N: Keira is actually eight in jak1, ten in jak two, eleven in jak 3, and 14 in jakx, so thats what I mean by her only just coming of age, its also the reason Jak hasn't merried her sooner.) a certain eco can be consumed by their body, the existense of this eco is widely disputed by the precursors, but aparrently during great battles this eco is awoken and finds a host, and everyone who dies in that battle will die painlessly, and in extreme cases, this person can stop death without harming herself, the precursors tell that once during the last battle against the metal-heads, their army had such a being, but she was inexperienced and tried to take on too much. The strain was too much, and she died, and all the precursors she was keeping alive died with her."

"So now Keira has this gift too does she?" Asked Jak.

"We beleive so, with my many years experience as a sage, I have learnt one thing, and thats be open to anything." Said Samos.

"Now what I want to know is what was in that kiss between the two of you."

Samos looked sad and akward, he looked down at his apparently sleeping daughter, and said, "Keira never knew who her mother was. I told her she died when she was younger. But that was just because I couldn't bear to tell her the truth.

Keira sat up in bed and made everyone jump by suddenly yelling. "WELL SHES AWAKE NOW SO YOU'D BETTER TELL HER!"

Now it was the other persons turn to speak. "Keira, I never wanted to leave you, I had to go north, I had had a vision that the metal-heads were coming south, and had to go to stop them, the only reason you lived your whole life without a mother is because I left you when you needed me most, I am sorry...my child."

And now everyone stared at everyone stared at the woman, not quite knowing what to say, Keira just stuttered for a while. "I..I..I don't know what to say, I need some space for a second. No wait, Jak, you stay here."

The two sages left, leaving Jak and Keira alone. "I know how you feel, I grew up not knowing my father OR mother. you get used to the knowledge eventually."

"Thats not what I'm worried about. I"m uneasy about this so called gift, so it means that I take the pain of anyone around me, including the enemy, well thats a lot of use isn't it."

"Well Shorine said that with proper training you could learn to control your power and only save the people you want to."

"AND HOW AM I MEANT TO TRAIN, JUST SHOOT SOMEONE AND HOPE I SAVE HIM, IS THAT WHAT YOU HAD IN MIND JAK, IS IT?"

"Well while the rest were talking I devised a way to train, you could use me to practice on."

Keira looked as if she was about to be swallowed by a metal-pede. "I couldn't do that, I just couldn't watch someone do that to themselves, and especially you Jak, I just love you too much for my own good."

"Oh theres no dabate about it, we need this power of yours to help us fight the metal-heads, and I'm going to make sure that when we use it a) we don't bring back the enemy, and b) it doesn't hurt you to do it, now you only seem to react badly to large scale death, so this won't hurt you too much." He said, and shot himself in the head.

Keira scremed, not in pain, for her gift was enough to bring him back in an instant, but at the sight of seeing her loved one do that to himself for her sake, she didn't have time to fear much, because he sat right back up gasping and said. "That was brilliant Keira, there's not even a burn mark from the blaster, now, again, and killed himself again. This continued for several hours before Keira told him to stop.

"Thats all I can take of seeing you murder yourself. I think I can do it now, I'm ready for the battle.

on an offshore oil rig in the Cataenas Ocean

The young man on the rig was dying, a storm had swept through but seconds ago, he had been sheltered by the drill, eco was pouring out of the top, spreading throuout the bowels of the ship, soon it would reach his vantage point, and death would come for him, he consigned himself to his death, he wasn't afraid, he was almost happy, his life had been a misery, growing up in the slums in Haven, his mother dying when he was six, and he never knew his father, the young mans name was Meaelan, his hair was yellow with a green tinge at the end, he had often been told he looked like the great hero Jak, but he didn't like that, it just meant he was a bit like someone everyone knew, not himself.

He could now see the dark eco pouring out of the hatch into the section he was in, he knew it was coming and despaired, but he saw something in the sky, a strange, celestial-blue light, coming closer, he could see its form now, and was amazed at what he saw. It was Jak, king of Haven city, coming to save him, he dragged himself to his feet, the dark eco burns all over his body aching at the effort, he yelled to the man, trying to catch his attention, he didn't need to, Jak's keen eyes had spotted him a long time ago, he sped down at over 100 miles an hour, he slowed down as he came closer, and yanked the mans hand just as the eco began the nibble at his shoes, but the man was safe, he was being carried back to his home, he was safe...he was safe...he was...

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: and with that we see the introduction of Maealan, he will play an important role in this story and its sequel, so watch carefully.


	7. Chapter 7: the allied islands

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: hello again and welcome to chapter seven, I finally got some reviews, well, one anyway.

_Inuace_: I'm glad you like the beggining, I'll be continuing for some time, I have planned to have about 15 chapters, so keep watching this space.

CHAPTER SEVEN: THE ALLIED ISLANDS

Jak was just getting used to the fact that he had a new future mother-in-law, and Keira had taken it without any grace at all, she threw tantrums often, trying to get out all the rage she had built up over the years about not having a mother, even Jak got kinda scared of her when she was in full swing. Jak hadn't been seeing Daxter lately, which he found strange,they used to be inseperable, now he spentmore time with Tess than ever, just sitting there and bragging about his so-called "adventures".

And he himself had been busy, a gargo cruiser that went off course in the Cataenas reported seeing a string of islands along the horizon, spanning many thousands of miles all the way down past Shassa and Mamoron, and Towards Nissen. Also there ws the small matter of young Maealan, the brave young lad had signed up for the FL not days after being rescued by Jak, and was quickly rising through the ranks, by the end of his first week he had gone from private to General, and then by the second week he was a fully fledged eagle captain, riding the skies on the ragles, he and Jak had become good friends, and Jak had once suggested to Torn that he should become a light trooper, the greatest honor a soldier can have, to be changed by the precursors themselves with light eco, into something like light Jak, this was sort of like the dark warrior program, excapt the experimentees actually volunteered for it.

But it wasn't all good news, Commander Kun had been sent to investigate a possible dark-eco infestation in Cafas north of Haven, he and his men never returned, and Jak deemed Cafas unsuitable for traversing by any other than the lurkers, who had generously accepted their offers and given full military support for any coming battles.

Jak was now headed for Freedom Tower, he had been asked (forcefully) by Torn to investigate the strange islands in the east, and Jak had decided to take Maealan, Keira and Karena, who would all be useful if it turned out to be metal-headed. He turned the corner to the Hyper-lift and ran straight into Kleiver's belly.

"Hello there an..."

"Yes I know, I know, ankle biter and all that, I havn't got time for your shit now Kleiver, so get out of my way unless you want another creaming, do you remember the Kras city championship, or do you need reminding?"

Kleiver just grinned and patted the side of his nose with his finger." Now I know you're trying to get me riled up, but it aint gonna work, I heard yer on yer way to those islands that everyone's talking about, I'm coming too, if ya' know whats good for ya'."

"I wouldn't let you come if you begged me, you'd probably just rape Keira on the journey just for the heck of it."

"I probably would at that, but what if I told you you could have me chained and locked the whole way there, and then even leave me there if it was metal-head territory, I need to get away from here, you've managed to tame the streets too much, Kras is _safe_ now that you've put Rayn in her place, with Sig ruling Spargus I'm hardly gonna get any crime done there, you've managed the turn the KG into nice, loving FL troopers, and _someone_ took away my passport so I can't get to anyplace more exiting, you owe me."

Jak considered it, catch a criminal, or jeopardise the safety of his fiance and friend, then again, he would be watching him the whole time, what could happen? "OK, deal." and he shook the Fugitives hand.

six hours later

The entire flight had been uneventfull, Keira had slept the journey, having been out all night celebrating her new found ability to drink. Jak had watched Kleiver like a hawk, making sure he didn't even look at Keira on Karena in the wrong way, the young dark eco sage had been in the simulation room fighting fake metal-heads for the first four hours, and only came out when the computer had broken down trying to keep up with the rate she destroyed the holographic monsters. By five hours in they could see the islands, and understood why the witnesses had been so amazed, he could see nothing but islands as far as the eye could see.

They landed in thick jungle, there was no sign of any metal-heads around, but there was a strange thing, a great hole in the ground that looked as if it had once housed a great tree, Jak looked on for a few metres and found the oak snapped in half lying over half a kilometre away, he wondered what could have done this, it wasn't mechanical, and a metal-pede wouldn't have had the dexterity to pick it up, only to knock it over.

They had wandered for a few miles with Kleiver on the end of a long chain about thirty metres in front, with Jak and Maealan at the back setting out a plan if there was a hostile creature there.

A great crash echoed through the trees, pounding footsteps shaking the ground, entire trees were uprooted by the sheer force, the group scattered, Jak and Keira ran off towards the clearing they had passed some time ago, Maealan and Karena scuttled in the direction they had been facing origonally, Kleiver waddled akwardly for a short time, but he couldn't go far, the chains were tripping him with every step, he fell, he could hear the thing coming closer and closer. He should have been able to see it in a second, and the pounding slowed down, the branches in front of him parted to show a vast creature of purple and black. It was emanating pure evil, malice in its eyes as it stepped smugly towards the old racer, sheer terror flooding his face for the first time in forty-eight years. It was the last thing he ever saw.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: I'm glad I finally got round to a killing, and at least it was a character that everyone loves to hate, rather than Keira or Sig, who were my other possibilities, but I stand by my decision, I've just done chapter six on this very same day, so I've just done two chapters in one day, and I still had time to sleep in and watch _dune,_ I'm really enjoying this and coyuld you please all review thank you, I've done seven chapters and still only got one.


	8. Chapter 8: the demon of the jungle

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: weel hello again dear readers, I see you still havn't been reviewing, now in this I am going to finally tell you what that thing in the jungle is, and I assure you that these things are entirely my idea, although I have submitted some ideas for enemys and allies in jak5 to my friend in Naughty Dog, so if you see these creatures in any future Jak games, you can know that I thought of them first.

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CHAPTER EIGHT: THE DEMON OF THE JUNGLE

The four adventurers met up some way to the north as the creatures footsteps receded to the south, they made their way back to the clearing they had been in when the thing attacked. And found Kleiver's body lying twisted and mangled on the ground, his face scarred and crisped by the dark eco on the beast's body, clearly dead. Keira didn't even try to revive him, the wounds of dark eco could not be healed by her gift, maybe the old gangster would have teken heart in the fact that at least one tear was shed for him, in whatever hell he woke up in.

They made their way further north, not speaking to each other, the memory of his corpse stuck in all their heads, Jak had witnessed death aplenty his whole life, he was sure he saw more people killed by the guards in the prison than he had by the metal-heads, but he still had never seen anything as horrifying as that. They came to a crossing, another island waiting for them just over the water, Jak went in first, looked around for anything that might fancy some hero stew, and called that it wa safe, Keira was hoisted onto his shoulder,and Maealan presumed to do the same to Karena, who hopped across the stream without even touching the water, smiling wryly at him from the opposite side. The young eagle captain stepped tentatively to the water, and was halfway across before he noticed a dark patch on the floor of the river, curiosity in his nature, he lowered hid head into the water to take a look, and jolted back up in surprise, his head quickly followed by a huge shark like creature with tentacles for fins. It leapt upon the man and strapped itself to his face, its suckers on the inside injecting something into him, dark eco.

Jak attempted to take aim with his blaster, but Maealan thrashed around in pain, the thing seemed to be growing larger with every second, Jak gave it up and jumped into the water, ripping the beast off the screaming mans face and dissapearing into the murky dapths, Karena crwled cautiosly towards Maealan and dragged him to shore. Keira just stared at the surface, waiting for her hero to emerege, a small bubble brock the stillness, then nothing.

Keira screamed, and tryied to jump in, she was sure she could still fell his life force, positive, but the other two pulled her out.

"There's nothing you can do Keira, he's gone." Said Maealan.

Keira looked bewildered, she was too distressed to talk, they didn't understand, she could feel him still alive down there, he needed help. The thre were too budy scuffling to notice him rising out of the water with the thignin his hand.

"Hey!" He shouted, making them all turn and stare. "D'you mind getting your hands off my wife and helping me out of here?"

The young future-queen laughed and practically jumped at him, making him sink back down a couple of feet. "OK you're making me sink here, you really need to go on a diet." He spluttered, and received a hearty slap for it.

four hours later

They had been walking for what seemed like days, and still hadn't found anything, Jak had had a short run in with another of the things that had attacked the transport in Shassa, but it was dealt with easily, and Keira healed his wounds. They were approaching a clearing, obscured by trees they couldn't see what was in it. They emerged from the shrubbery in awe, a massive facility stood in front of them, old precursor metal looking back at them. Each one cried in delight and Keira rushed in first, crying out for anyone who was in the vicinity to come out, and stopped in her tracks, bones cracked under her feet, skeletons hung off the wall on spikes, dark patches dotted all ovr them, each one bent back, mouths open in a never ending scream, there was something written on the wall in blood. It read, _the demon creature has come, they are using the altar to awaken the dark two once again, we cannot get out, cannot, get, ou..._ Tears ran down her face, if she had been here she could have saved all these people, but they had all died the same death as Kleiver.

Jak sidled up beside her and put his arm around his young love, her form breaking down in his arms, he led her out of the room to the clearing, telling the others what had happened, they all despaired.

"Can we make it back to the transport, if we can get to Haven we can send troops in, there's obviously a large concentration of eco in the area, we need to take this land." Pointed out Maealan.

"No, this place is death to all who come here, I saw the Mamoron sign on the wall in there, if that country, in all its military and strategic power couldn't bring that thing down, then I doubt a city thats only just getting back on its feet can." Answered Jak.

"But we still may have to fight it to get to the ship, my dark poweres can take us some way, but after I don't have the strength to fly anymore, we're on the road walking again." Said Karena.

While the group debated on what to do two pairs of eyes were watching them from the trees, hidden from the explorers by more than shade.

"Well my sister, it seems we have found this hero sooner than expected, maybe we should just kill him now and be done with it." Said Gol.

"Well that would be practical,but we don't want to reveal ourselves just yet, and we havn't yet fully recovered from our long imprisonment, and besides, I see a beter way to get at him. The young girl, Samos's daughter isn't she, he cares for her obviously, I beleive we can make that work to our advantage, but we may as well send the demon creature to get them, just to test his power, and the other one, she claims to be the dark eco sage, a claim taken only by you my brother, we could send a tortured creature after her, do you think? said Maia.

"Very well then, but be quick about it, they have almost come to an agreement."

The arguement had finally been decided, Jak was to take keira and use light flight to get back to the ship, and Karena would use her dark flight to get there, while Maealan had already summoned his ragle, and would be using him to make it back.

Jak fired up his wings and watched as dark tendrils bagan to sread across Karena's, the tendrils grew in sizt to cover her spine entirely, then tey branched out and skin grew between them, forming the basis for the wings, and then it expandd to become over four eight feet from wingtip to wingtip, she turned around to catch Maealan looking at her in a rather sensous way, he quickly coughed and looked in the other direction. She smiled mischeviously, and made a mental note to be as teasing to him as possible.

Jak put his ear to the ground and listened, he could hear a melodic thumping, far off now, but coming closer every second, it was getting faster, he looked over to Maealan who was still waiting for his ragle to arrive, it wouldn't get there in time.

"NEVER MIND THE DAMN BIRD, KARENA, JUST TAKE HIM, WE GOTTA GO NOW!"

He grabbed Keira by the waist and hoisted her into his arms, not even letting her look down at what came out of the trees, Karena and Maealan only just got off the ground before a massive creature with foot long horns growing out of its head, claws glistening with dark eco, and long spikes growing out of it's spine took a swipe at where they had been, the entire earth shook with the strength of its roar, it grabbed a tree, uprooted it and hurled it at the flying people, it clipped Karena, making her drop Maealan, hie body fell through the trees and landed in front of a man, wreathed in shadow, but eyes shining bright blue in the faint light.

"Come with me, and the light shall guide you home." He siad, and Maealan did so, this was the kind of person you could trust, his body shone with a brilliance that the young man had never seen before whenever he passed into the light, Maealan had no doubt that this man was one of the creatures he had seen, excapt instead of being created from dark eco, he was forged from light, he was one of the beings from _Dei Dailan Ok Eco, _the land of eco.

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THEMAKEROFLIGHT: you all thought I was going to kill him didn't you, but I've already had my two compulsory deaths ( Kun and Kleiver ), so I wasn't going to do another only one chapter after the last, and for a full list of all the creatures I invented, check out my profile. 


	9. Chapter 9:loyal to a madman

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well now we get back to Haven in this chapter and a new plot is uncovered so you really don't want to miss it, and I noticed something strange, 110 people read chapter 1 but only 26 went on to read chapter 2, which isn't very good for my self esteem, and not many of you are reviewing, so please do, it really helps.

CHAPTER NINE: LOYAL TO A MADMAN

No one spoke on the journey back, each one was avoiding each others eyes, nothing could bring Karena out of her daze, she just kept blaming herself, she didn't hold him, she told herself. Jak was sitting with Keira in his arms, she had cried her eyes red when they got to the ship, trying desperately to get to the jungle to save him, she could still fel him, but only faintly, Jak convinced her that even if he was alive, the demon would get him any minute, and them as well if they went searching. Keira saw Maealans ragle land in a part of the forest, and a moment later she felt a life force snuffed out like a candle, and a great roar echoed through the air, and just as much sorrow went for the bird as for the men, the ragles were like people in their own way, each with their own personalitie, and emotions.

Jak looked out the window, he had always loved the surface of the planet, and most of the countries were vivible from just as high as the transport went, he saw haven city about four hundred miles ahead, and Damas to the north, which he himself had named, and down to the south the smoking remains of Shassa could be seen, and behind them, beyond the islands that had caused them such pain, was a dark scene, high black mountains rising and falling to the constant eco storms that blew over head, many crusades had been made by the ancient kings of Nissen, Ilian, and probably the island civilisation as well, to this deadly place, the metal head land, Hora Dailan, the dark world.

Most of Haven met them as they stepped off the walkway, the city had become crowded as repairs were still under way and many sections had been cordoned off because of the remains of metal-head structures beneath the pavement. Everyone was anxious to know if there was habitable land on the islands, they weren't happy with the answers they got.

"I, and my colleagues have visited these islands, and were quite sure that they were impossible to live in." Said Jak into the mic. "We left with five members of our group, we're returning with three, one of them...was a dear friend, there is a murderous creature on the main island, we found an old civilisation on one of the larger ones, all the people within were dead, they had been trapped inside with no rations, the creature had eventually broken through their defenses, they all bore the red fist of Mamoron."

The news that they were from Mamoron shocked the spectators more than the news of a giant cerial monster, they were used to massive beasts of darkness, Mamoron was highly renoued for their defensive skill, and were one of the few countries to have survived the metal head invasion without letting a single tin-head set foot inside their border, and were the one reason Shassa was kept safe for years, being the only city touching it, the only way to Shassa was through Mamoron.

"WHAT IS THIS CREATURE!" Yelled one of the press.

"We beleive that it is one of the ancient dark eco creatures of the old world, such things have not been seen since the days of Gol and Maia, before Jak here destroyed them. The old scriptures in Haven library written by Gol before he became twisted give detailed descriptions of each and every one of these thing, the one we encountered, was called a demon creature, Jak also had breif run-ins with a pool creature and a tiger creature." Interjected Karena from behind the podium.

"These things tend to turn up where ever there's eco." Said Jak. "So for this reason, we're outlawing any travel to Cafas due to its high eco concentration, only authorised runs are allowed. The only way we are going to beat these thing is if we take back that tank factory that was overrun by metal-heads years ago, scouts report that there is still a lot of metal-head activity, so we need the help of new recruits to get it back, join the freedom league and save the city. That is all."

The members of the collective press made their way back to the newspapers and magazines factorys to report the stories, a little downtrodden, they had expected their great king to say a little more on what happened to his lost companions, other than "five went, three returned."

Karena, Keira and Jak took a zoomer to the Naughty Ottsel, and found Daxter being coochie-cooed by Tess, his leg plaster still on from a brief scuffle with a four year old.

"I swear that kid had to be at least ten, he's too strong to be four." He excused himself. Despite being married for nearly a year, Tess still hadn't cottoned on to Daxter's tall tales, most of the army was making bet on how long until she figured it out.

"Hey Dax, still reeling from your fight with a toddler." Jak chuckled.

"Yeah yeah laugh it up, cos I'll have the last laugh, WHEN I USE MY SUPER ANIMAL KILLER INSTINCT ON YOU, WAAHH CYOOHHH CHAAA! Ow my leg."

"Well you can just chill there cos I'm gonna be out doind hero stuff while you're stuck here with Tess."

"YAY!" Creid Tess. "Maybe I can take you on a shopping trip, those trousers of yours are getting quite worn out, and I need a new bra, Daxter snapped the last one."

Daxter looked like someone had just let loose a metal-head in the room. "TESS! I told you not to tell them about that sort of stuff." He complained.

"AAWW but Daxie-poo, we love to hear about your sweet little stories, tell us some more Tess." Teased Keira.

"Aaahhh stuff it." said Daxie-poo. "I've gotta go, I got a colonial at three, seeya guys!" And wheeled himself out towards the pedestrian area.

Karena had been silent the whole time, just sitting at the bar throwing them down almost too fast for Tess to refill. She was deeply affected by Maealan's death, and by now everyone had figured out that there was something between them.

A familiar voice swept into the room. "What's wrong chillie-pepper, somethin' gettin' ya down?" I dont think this character needs an entrance.

"Hey there king Sig. How's Spargus been doing without me." Said the hero.

"Now what have I told you, you are the rightful heir to Spargus, to you I'm just plain old Sig, and besides, I'm gettin' sick of this king business. It gets downright annoyin' after a while."

"I am not the rightful heir, I was never a good son or king, you should be in charge cos I'd just mess things up, like I did last time." Muttered jak.

"Don't say that Jak, Damas would be proud of you, you saved the world three times and are rapidly coming up to a fourth." Consoled his wife. "And we all know that you could handle ruling both Spargus and Haven, and I'm pretty sure that you'll somehow end up the heir to Kras as well." She chuckled.

AT that tender moment Jak's comm decided to go off. Torn's crackled voice emmited from the speaker. "Jak, we've got a big force marching through the bazaar area, they're wearing KG armour and the Baron's sign, they don't look too friendly."

Jak gave keira a quick peck on the cheek and leapt onto his customised patrol vehicle, speedign off towards the bazaar. When he arrived, Torn's force and the intruders were just about to exchange shots, the others had the advantage, they obviously didn't give a damn for the civilians, while the FL would go to any means to protect innocents. The leader of the pack stepped forward and read from a roll of paper. "We, the last remaining loyalists to our dea departed Baron, declare that the false hero, Jak shal step forward, so that he may be charged accordingly."

Jak walked to the head of the FL force and said. "On what grounds do you presume to charge the king of Haven city?"

"We do not answer to a false king, we charge you with the murder of our beloved Baron, crimes against the people of Haven, conspiring against the KG, and worst of all, high treason!"

"Well you'll have to get through us first, the people love jak, the Baron was a tyrant, you have no power here, Jak is the rightful heir, and your so-called Baron seized power from the old ruler, and thereby attempted to break the bloodline of Mar himself." Yelled Torn and cocked his weapon, but jak lowered it to the ground.

"Let's here what they have to say first, then we'll kill them."

"We do not come here to be killed, we will fight to the last man if we have to, but not before that eco-freak is charged!" Yelled the leader.

"Now look here, I'm a reasonable man, and I'm inclined to give you a fair trial, but carry on like that and I'll kill you with my bare hands. Your Baron was killed by the metal-head leader, not me, the KG was a murderous bunch of cunts at the time, I did nothing to the people except free them, and as for high treason, how can you betray a fake ruler."

The loyalists didn't seem to have an answer for that, they had been told by their employer that Jak was a murderous bastard that had attempted to kill everyone in Haven, and then seize power from the Baron.

"It appears that our information was not entirely accurate, we wre told things about you by our employer, we were the last regiment to be stationed in Chairen before our forces were cut off from Haven by metalheads, we only just got back. I think its time we brought forward our employer."

And out of the pack, kicking and screaming, they brought Veger.

"I might've known, Veger you little rat, what lies have you been spinning now." Asked jak.

"None of this is lies you eco-freak!" Yelled the ottsel. "You helped the metal-heads get into the city.

"And you helped them bring down the palace." Returned Jak, making the loyalists give Veger a death-stare.

"Uhhh... well...you killed the Baron." He retorted.

"The Baron was killed by the metal-head-leader, not me, all I did was witness it."

At this point the now former loyalists decided that it was time to stop listening to Veger and give him the once over. They were just about to put a gun to his head before jak stopped them.

"Wait." He said. "I've got a better idea, we can send him to the islands, show him what it feels like to be exiled, his master died there, so its fitting."

The new force turned out to be led by General Jasen, who wasted no time in being brought up to date with what he'd missed, and getting a tour of the new and improved Haven, he was particularly impressed with how they had turned Dead Town into the pedestrian area, since he had fought in the battle there, he found it hard to think of it in any other way than destroyed. When they showed him Freedom Tower he was confused as to how the old Palace was brought down, when he learned that the metal-heads had actually made it inside the city he practically puked.

He was deeply ashamed with how he had acted towards Jak, and was worried that he and his men would be exiled, his worries were soon put to rest. Jak introduced him to all the gang, and explained the existence of Spargus, but the rest of the story would have to wait, there was a lot to tell.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well there's another character for you lot to think over, reviews would be greatly appreciated at this point, even flames, its always good to know what the readers like and don't like.


	10. Chapter 10: the long march of Haven

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well here we are again for another boring installment of...I can't be bothered, anyway, here's some responses to the reviews.

_Godmorninbeautiful2005_: thank you for your review, and I do plan on continuing my rate of updating, but am beginning to slow down from the origonal momentum of my first story.

_jakndaxluver_: actually Keiras age is never announced, but since she is born after little Jak gets sent back to sandover, she must be about three or four years younger than him, and a friend in naughty dog tells me that Jak is thirteen in jak one, making Keira nine or ten, so on and so forth.

I would like to take some time to try and put myself out of business by recommending some other authors and stories, I recommend Dark War by Cyrex, Risen demon and its sequel by redmage04, and anything by lightecosage. Now on with the show.

CHAPTER TEN: THE LONG MARCH OF HAVEN

Six days had passed since the appearence of Jasen and his lost company of KG, and they had been initiated into the FL to open arms, Haven council had argued that any men still loyal to the Baron should be sent to the islands just like Veger. But were put in their place by Jak when he said, "But that would make us like the Baron, and any who suggested it would have to be exiled just the same."

Both Jak and Keira were getting pretty nervous at this point, it was only two days ntil their wedding, and already it was looking as if they would have to postpone it, Haven was planning to move their forces into the islands and perform not just a colonisation, but a mass extermination of all hostile life, and both the King and his fiance would be needed for their gifts.

Jak had asked Sig and Rayn for any help in exchange for a portion of the islands, although both had accepted heartily, Jak knew that it still wouldn't be enough if there was more than one of those demons. And had swallowed his pride low enough into his boots to ask Haven's neighbors Chairen and Morien for assistance, and at this point it was looking like Haven wouldn't have that much land for themselves in the end, but Jak had managed to muster over 10.9 million for the invasion.

Fly-over reports indicated that there was close to 48 thousand islands, each about three square miles, stretching in a long band seperating the mainland from the Hora-dailan, the main faculty of genarals and commanders were scared stiff that there would be metal-heads there as well, but Jak assured them that the metal-heads were too scared of the eco creatures to come anywhere near the islands, which just made them more uneasy

Allow me to explain ow the invasion was planned, I have drawn a map of it myself so I know all the latitudes and longitudes and what direction all the forces come from, but to you it'll sound like I'm whistling in the dark. Imagine there are two vertical lines, the line on the left is Have and the surrounding countries, and the line on the right is the islands stretching down vertically as far as all the countries, Havens forces plan to spread out in a line as long as the islands, and land their men at the same time to allow them to spread across the the other end of the islands and kill anything in their way, simple really.

But before that Jak had been sent with Jasen to try and liberate the old tank factory. Many patrols had been sent in there, 500 men went in, one came out, gabbering about the dark animals, the entire place was thought to be infested, the Baron had lost it to the metal-heads when Krew's peircer bomb went off at the top, many people had been lost because he was too lazy to attempt to get it back, and Jasen was still amazed that he could have belsived a man like that was honest, much to his disgust Jak told him about the dark warrior program, how he had been injected daily, beaten, and even raped by Errol in the confines of his cell.

"I can't beleive it, I trusted that bastard with my life, he didn't give a yekows cock what happened to me did he?"

"Nope, not in the slightest, he also tried to get off with Keira when he learned that I knew her, and her using him to make me jealous didn't help my self esteem at the time."

The guards in front of them chuckled derisively, and got a swift jab to the head with the butt of Jasens rifle. "Knock it off you sorry bunch of losers."

Through the teams chatter and footsteps Jak heard something, just a little crack, like the breaking of a stick behind him, nothing too important, but when he heard that his ears automatically tuned in, he could hear scrabbling, soft breathing, the clank of metal on metal, he edged his hand towards his blaster, not being too obvious in case the person saw it, he could hear the breathing coming closer, he judged the distance to be about three to four metres, just a little closer, a bead of sweat ran down his face, and he swung the blaster around to see...Keira standing there in a combat outfit, looking profoundly terrified at having her boyfriend point a gun at her.

Jak lowered his gun with a look of rage on his face, he yanked her aside to a tree and whispered. "I cannot beleive you, I tell you to stay behind, that your place is with the others praparing, but you still disobey me and show up here, I can't beleive it, do you really want me to have a heart attack, the mere thought of you being here makes me terrified that I'm going to lose you, I can just see the metal-heads coming up towards you. I can't keep you completely safe all the time Keira."

"Well isn't it my decision if I come or not, I can help these people, they may all die if I'm not here, I know you can handle yourself but the rest aren't as experienced, besides, you don't control me." She retorted.

"I know some may die which is why its too dangerous for you to be her..." But he was cut off by Keira giving him a long passionate kiss.

"If we can't get through a deep dark old factory filled to the brim with spiky death, then how are we gonna survive marriage." She giggled, and only then noticed the FL trooper poking his head round the corner of the tree, who quickly scarpered once he realised she could see him.

After some amount of trekking through corridors and tunnels they came to the main production room for vehicles and transport, the machines were still stuck in place in the same position they were when they were shut down. Jak's sharp eyes spotted a cluster of metal head egs in the corner, and he hurled a red eco grenade into its midst, making scorpoins scuttle out from the darkness only to be blown apart by a hail of fire, the grenade exploded sending out a wave of red fire and disintegrating the eggs. Behind them was another dor that had been half melted by the eco covered sacks, the team set off down it, checking each and every passage as they went past it, so far there hadn't been any casualties, but Keira's ears were tingling, womens intuition was playing up, and she trusted that greatly.

The team came to a broken elevator shaft, Jak recognised it as the one that led to the landing pad where Krew's bomb had gone off, a young and stupid private stuck his head in and looked up to see a pair of mandibles staring back, he didn't even have time to scream before his head was ripped from his neck, Keira gasped slightly, but nothing more. Jak stuck his blaster in and aimed randomly, squeezing off six shots and sending the cloaked metal-head careening down to the bottom of the shaft, Jak risked a peek into the opening and declared it safe to climb.

He bent down for Keira to latch onto his back, and hoisted himself up to the rusted ladder, then the privates followed, with Jasen brining up the rear.

Keira heard a wolf whistle from down below and someone muttered. "I would be complaining if the view wasn't so enjoyable." And realised with horror that her trousers had been slipping down to reveal her pink knickers. She hastily pulled them back up and kicked hard at the top of the privates helmet.

They came to a dead halt and everyone bumped into the person above. One of them shouted, "Hey, whats the holdup!"

"We've hit a dead end, there's some debris's fallen down and gotten lodged, there's a passage to the left, I'll take a look down it." Jak replied, and then to Keira. "You stay here, if you follow me you may well get killed, I can handle myself, so I don't need your gift for this."

Keira reluctantly agreed, and perched herself on a rung, just waiting.

He had been gone for fifteen minutes when Keira declared, "Somethin must have heppened to him, I'm going in." And was just about to do so when something tugged at her trouser leg.

"Hold on there sweet cheeks, no need to rush, I think its time you and I got aquainted."

Keira tried to kick out, but he held her leg firm. "I hope you realise that you're attempting to rape the future queen of Haven, and that Jak'll kill you when he gets back."

"Oh I don't think blue-briches is coming back, he's probably dead, and that means no interuptions. I've been stuck out there for three years, no women on the regiment, gets kinda lonely." The soldier chuckled and was about to have his evil way before he in turn felt something tug on his ankle, ad was dragged from the rung and thrown into the darkness below, and in his place was Jasen, who made a rude gesture in the general directon of the falling man.

"And that goes for the lot of you, this woman is not to be touched by anyone, under pain of death."

Jak chose that moment to arrive through the hatch, panting, a dark stain on the side of his face. He gestured for them to come through, oblivious to the commotion the had just occured, Keira told him about it on the way, and expressed her feelings towards this little band of people, Jak hadn't heard her swear so much since her racing days.

Jak's main plan was to turn on the old security system, every old Haven building had three basic security measures, motion sensing turbo canons, for when invaded by metal-heads, a poisoness gas released into the air that targets specific areas, for when whole sectors are overrun, and the most lethal of all, a dark eco purge. This sends a massive eco shockwave through every room except the one with the trigger itself, that was what Jak was aiming for, from old maps Torn had shown him, he was about fifteen minutes away from the control room.

The shaft they were in widened into a corridor, making it possible to stand, the members of the group had long been put in place by Jak, and they no longer looked at Keira in case he or their commander took it the wrong way.

Jak heard a soft clang from above him and whipped out his gun, twirling it and giving the signal for the rest to do the same, Jak and Jasen kept Keira between them, protecting her from every side, she herself had come prepared, and surprised everyone by brining out a peacemaker she had borrowed from Sig, the young girl was dwarfed by the weapon, it was almost taller than her!

The band circled as the clanging a bashing got louder, they could hear a ticking trail of footsteps in the ducts above, the less experienced members began to panic, breathing heavily and shooting at nothing. Jak heard a cry from behind him and whirled round to see a peir of flailing legs disappear into the duct above. A lone soldier screamed at the sight of his friend being brutally slaughtered and ran off from the gruop in the direction they had came, he didn't get far. A four legged blaster metal-head dropped through the ceiling and landed on top of him, tearing away chunks of flesh, the man screamed for a second then realised that there was no pain, a ball of blue lightning slammed into the side of the creature, sending it flying into the wal where its skull gem popped out and its body disintegrated.

The man stood up and looked down at his wounds, they were knitting before his vey eyes, he wiped blood from his skin and found no cuts underneath. He stared over at the young woman who was concentrating on healing the pain and found a new respect for her.

More and more metal-heads were dropping on either side, Jak and Jasen guarding the group from the bigger ones, while the others took out the smaller ones. Keira stepped forward and shot a low charged peacemaker shot at a large group of bouncing leapers, sending a cascade of electricity through each one.

Jak heard a roar from down the passageway and turned cautiosly towards it, then yelled for his companions to run on to the control room, he could see the corridor breaking up in front of him, something huge coming down it too big for the tight walls, he grabbed Keira and hurled her bodily through the open door to the room, which they had now reached, and slammed it shut.

Keira tried to get through the door before it closed but Jasen stopped her, "Jak can defeat that thing himself, its not worth you getting killed."

Jak turned to face the beast, from the depths of his mind he remembered this thing as the same kindthat had tried to kill Sig all that time ago in the underport. The thing reared up its head t strike down on him, Jak pirroeted out of the way and brought out the beam reflexor, the shafts of yellow light bouncing off the close walls and spearing burnin holes in the things flesh, like Sig had sai, it only made it madder.

Inside the room people were scurying to get the pulse operational, cogs and wheels being turned here and there, not many of them even knew what they were pushing, but they did it all the same. Keira had located the valve to turn the power on, but needed help from Jasen to turn it, even that small delay she knew was one more second until she felt the life force on the other side of the door give out, she was rapidly healing his wounds through the metal as she felt them happen, it wasn't long until she couldn't keep up anymore.

The young man that Keira had saved turned out to be an expert mechanic and quickly found the switch for the pulse, calling to Keira to come help. In a few more seconds the power would reach the conduit, it might be too late by then though, thought Keira.

Jak ducked to avoid a jumping wolf metal-head and turned to shoot it before it reached the door, he couldn't hold out much longer, more and more creatures were arriving by the second. And then he felt the wave building and gasped, he hadn't felt that much eco in one place since being on the dark maker ship. Knowing what was coming he crouched down beside the door and braced himself.

A force of opure eco emmited from the walls, electricity played over all it touched, Jak felt himself burnin, he couldn't breathe through the eco, entire ranks of metal-heads were melting into nothing by the second, the great beast that everyone had feared so much was felled in less than five, but Jak held on, his skin raging with the full power of the wave. Making it turn a purplish hue, his voice became a roar as the demon inside took over. And then it stopped.

Keira gingerly opened the door and looked out, masses of metal-heads had been caught off guard, many had tried to escape once realising what was happening, only to be caught in mid air by the delayed shock wave. And then she saw Jak, a bit charred, but alright, smiling at her. Her eyes brightened and she hugged him tightly, kissing all over his crisped face.

"Are you OK." she said.

"I'll be fine." He answered. "A little pick-me-up at the Naughty Ottsel and I'll be ready to fight again.

After a week of production at the factory Havens fleet now had over 3 000 tanks, an extra 10 000 helcats, and a seperate part of the building never shown to anyone but the Barons most trusted advisors revealed 5 000 battle-ready bomb-bots in full working condition, apparently the Barons plan was that if ever the factory was overtaken he would blow the explosives and stop the metal-heads getting hold of his precious technology.

Haven port had become a bustle of activity with cruisers and frigates coming and going from Kras, Spargus, Chairen, Morien, and what was left of Shassa had helped too, and had managed to conince Mamoron's government to supply troops and tech. Most of the force had already gone ahead to Damas to set up a temporary base for invasion. Jak was in the middle of asking Brutter if they would help, the lurker baloons would come in very handy for reconaissance and reinforcements, the old war lurker had accepted before Jak had finished his sentence, the lurkers owed him a great debt for freeing all those lurker brothers from the clutches of Baron Praxis.

Jak was jst about to move out to his flagship when he saw Keira. She looked extremely egitated.

"Keira! What's wrong." He said as she fell into his arms, tears streaming down her face.

"It's daddy, hes gone, I've looked everywhere, and even Shorine doesn't know where he is, I think he might have been captured somehow." The young girl couldn't take the stress and fell apart, shuddering with confusion and sadness.

"Sshh Keira, we'll find him, don't worry, even if he has been captured the kidnappers would need him alive, and you havn't felt any death lately, not since you noticed his abcence." She shook her head. "Well that means he must be fine, we will find him, it's OK, Keira, it's OK." He consoled the young woman, cradling her in his biceps, he lifted her onto the flagship and told the captain to push off. They were away, on the long march, the allaince had finally been realised, all of the world was united, against the eco creature, and the metal-heads.

in the depths of an ancient citadel

The old mans head was acheing, he had obviously had a little too much booze, but then he remembered that he hadn't had any booze, e was just about to go on a long journey, he hadn't wanted to be drun in case of an emergency, then he realised he could feel iron rings around his ankles and wrists, shackles, why were they there. He opened his eyes and peered through the half darkness, two familiar faces looked back at him.

"Hello Samos old friend." Said a wheezing voice. "It's nice to see you again."

That was all he heard, before he blacked out again.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well that was it, quite a long chapter for me I must say, but I did it in the end, I hope you all don't hate me or anything, cos I'm about to do another cliffhanger, but stay on the line, I've got a nice juicy twist for you.


	11. Chapter 11: cold feet

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: greeting, welcome, I got some more reviews to say thanks for,

_envious lust_: thanks envy, I update nearly every day usually, but I staved my arm at an ice-rink so my typing speed has been slowed down, but I'm getting along.

I really appreciate the reviews but would greatly hope for more, I've had over 400 hits but only 4 reviews, please tell me what you think of the story, even flames would be welcome, you wouldn't like it if only one person reviewed for every hundred that read the story would you?

CHAPTER ELEVEN: COLD FEET

Jak stormed about the room in full on dark-power mode, he didn't often get into a rage like this, but when he did not even Keira was brave or dtupid enough to go near him, unlucky for her that she was the one he was raging about, it was supposed to be their wedding day tomorrow, it had been planned ahead as the same day Ashelin and Torn got married, and Keira was adamant that it would go ahead. Jak argued that the ship didn't have the facilities for weddings, or a priest, or anything else for that matter, there had been a fight and...well, it was as if they were already married.

Jak was in the middle of turning a very expensive antique chair inro very expensive antique toothpicks when some poor unwitting person decided to knock on the door. Jak wrestled control over his body before his dark side devoured whoever it was, and yanked open the door to reveal Seem, Jak found this strange. He hadn't seen her name on the passenger roster, and this was a Haven ship, she should have been on one of the Spargus freighters.

"Greeting hero," she courtsied and made the gesture of peace. "Please do not be alarmed by my appearence, I was asked to come by your young wife-to-be, I have been informed of the situation between the two of you, and have come to put it right."

"So you've been sent to try and win me over, well it's not gonna work, look, I don't mean to be rude...but, there's another reason I don't want to marry Keira before the battle, a woman younger than eighteen and un-married cannot take part in any major battle without the permission on her father or guardian, up till now Samos has been giving her that permission. But if she marries me then I can give her that right in Samos' absensce, and I just know that she'll persuae me somehow."

"I understand." Seem looked for something to say to him, but words got in the way, she put her hand on his temple and initiated the ancient rite, her mind turning to the other place, and taking his with it. I cannot tell you what either of them saw there, for neither told, but after coming out of the trance Jak understood the urgency to wed, and gave in at last.

It was the next day. The mess hall hadbeen turned into the place where it would all happen, the crates had been upended to make pews, and all the boxes piled up at the front to make a huge platform, Jak was already up the front in what Daxter kapt calling a "penguin suit." He could just see out of the corner of his eye Tess blowing her nose on Daxter's shirt, the man himself looking dazed after the bachelor party. The organ music, played by Shorine, started up and the congregaton turned to gain a glance at the loverly bride, they weren't dissapointed. She looked stunning, Jak thought he hadn't seen her all dolled up since he caught her putting on makeup in Sandover when the two of them were going on an expidition into the forbidden jungle.

Keira just stared at the platform in front of her, she couldn't beleive it was finally happening, she felt her whole life had been leading up to this moment, in her mind she thought that her father would be proud, and she turned to look at the empty space beside her, her daddy should have been there to see her.

Before she knew it she was at the altar, Semm taking up position on the other side, as a precursor monk Seem was fully qualified to bond and wed couples, and was no stranger to the hastily thrown together ceremony.

"Dearly beloved." She started, but her croaky voice wasn't up to the strain of having to carry throughout the huge hall, so Daxter fetched her a microphone and she started again. "Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to witness the bonding of King Jak Mar, and Keira Hagai, if antone her knows of any lawful reason why these two should not be wed, speak now or forever hold your peace."

Jak had to grab Daxter by the neck to stop him releasing a fake tumbleweed. "Good, then we shall begin, do you, King Jak Mar of Haven city, defeater of the metal heads, hero of the precursors, and savior of us all, take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife. Do you promise to love and cherish her, in sickness and in health, so long as you both shall live?"

"I do." Said Jak smiling.

"And do you Keira Hagai, daughter of the green eco sage, lady of Haven and mechanic extraordinaire, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband. Do you promise to..." But the monk was cut off by Keira's quick response.

"I most certainly do."

"Uuuhhh, well then I pronounce you husband and wife, you may kiss the bride."

Jak did heartily, tipping his love as he did so, still sruck in his cast iron embrace Keira lobbed the bouquet in no particular direction, and by some curse it landed in Karena's lap, the young woman looked down at the flowers in her hand. A single tear ran down her cheek, she summoned her dark eco energy into her hands, making the flower wilt and die. The sage crushed the petals to her chest, and dissappeared into the crowd.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: and this is about the time that I regret telling you lot the Maealans still alive, that scene would have been much sadder if you all thought he was dead, ah well, did you enjoy it, cos I certainly enjoyed writing it, hope you all review, bye.


	12. Chapter 12: the eco war

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: hello there one and all, hope you enjoyed last chapter even if it was a bit short. In this one you find out what all the fuss over Keira not fighting was, and its not what you think.

CHAPTER TWELVE: THE ECO WAR

It was just three days after their marriage and already they were behaving like a long married couple, Jak and Keira were now two of the most important people in most of the world, a king without a wife or heir isn't worth much after all.

Torn had drawn out a very specific battle plan, the section that Haven was going to take out consisted of about thirty islands, including the one where the base was found, they would spread from the relatively small islands on the outside and then expand into the middle where the landmass was more dense, and where they would find the more massive creatures, unfortunately what with all the lost information the armies of Haven had never figured out that the closer you get to water the bigger they get, so starting on the outside was not a good idea, even so, it was all they had.

Keira was becoming more and more concerned with Karena, ever since the wedding she had been so cold, like her emotions had just drained away. Nothing could seem to bring her out of her sulk, and even Daxter's annoying voice couldn't prompt her to swing a sword, and many of the crew doubted her ability to fight in the upcoming battle, even though she got up and started practising whenever Jak mentioned the prospect of killing eco creatures.

They had been out of Calsa port in Damas for a day and were nearing the choke point, this was where many ships had gone done gurgling from heavy storms, but it was the only way around the massive reef blocking way to the islands by sea. Jak had gathered all the members of the light troopers and devised a plan, each one would spread out over the entire fleet and cast one big eco sheild over the ships, which was no mean feat considering that the whole lot was over 300 ships, but Jak was sure they could do it.

In marital bliss was the way no one would describe the two newlyweds, they had had almost no time to themselves between sorting out matters of state and being congratulated by everyone on the ship, and all the others for that matter, Sig was particularly annoyed that he hadn't been invited, having known Keira well from her days of working in the Hip Hog. Rayn had raised a few eyebrows by squealing over the comm link at the sight of the massive rock that Jak had given Keira, which funnily enough was part of the big one Gordy and Willard had dug out of that cave in the volcanic crater.

Eiun,the newly appointed leader of the light troopers, was scuttling around looking for Jak, obviously in a state of panic, he found him holding a sleeping Keira, there had been a lot of victims of eco storms in Calsa, and she had used all her energy healing them. Jak didn't look happy to see him, knowing that he would only be in that sort of way if there was a serious problem.

"My lord Jak, I have urgent news, I have just managed to squeeze some information out of the other troopers, and it appears...well..."

"Would you spit it out so I can sort it out as quick as possible." Said the clearly annoyed king.

"Well, it has just come to my attention that, well, most of the troopers can't even fly, and the ones that can won't be able to in a storm."

Jak was pretty much ready toeat the man standing before him, not because of the news, but because there was an answer onboard the ship, he hadn't needed to come and disturb what little time he had to himself.

"Well its pretty obvious what to do, we just use the lurker balloons to transport the troopers, you should have thought of that, if those damn medals on your chest are anything to go by."

"Yess sir, I thought of that, but we need you to ask the ammbassodor personally, none of us dare to, he is a lurker after all."

Jak hated that the old predudices were still around, but grudgingly agreed to help, he laid out Keira's head on the sofa in his quarters, and made his way to the emmbassy.

Jak reached there with much cheering and clapping from all the lurker soldiers, they held him as their King also for his services to them during the long dark years of slavery in Haven. Brutter saw him and practically jumped on him.

"Jak friend, it good to see you, what bring you to lurker house, may my brothers and I do anything for you?"

"Actally Brutter I came to ask a favour, it turns out that only a few troopers can fly competently, leaving our plan to get through the storms scuppered. Unless we can use your balloons to transport them above the fleet, with your permission of course.:

"We would be happy to help old friend, you are honorary member of lurker tribe, and a lurker never forgets."

"Great, that's what I thought you'd say, now I can get back to some peace." He was about to leave, but a heavily wounded lurker burst through the door, roaring in it's own language, Brutter became agitated as the lurker continued.

"Jak, people are coming with guns, they shoot lurker brothers up, they coming for me they say."

Jak was getting death stares from all the lurkers in the room, they thought that he had sent them, who could blame them, the men were wearing Jak's seal. He yanked the gun off his back and charged through the door, closely followed by Brutter who had grabbed a massive blaster from a gun rack and was strapping on armour as he walked.

There were sounds of guns being fired through the walls, the lurker embassy ship was already overrun, screams and roars echoed through the halls, lurker ears recognised each bestial roar as a death cry.

Jak opened fire on the guards without hesitation, whether they were traitors or just predudiced against lurkers he didn't care, Brutter and three other giant beasts leaped into a hoard of at least ten guards and dispatched them all in under a minute. Jak threw himself into the fray, becoming half human half demon, causing utter chaos wherever he was, one particularly stupid soldier with the chevrons of leadership on his shoulder decided to shoot Jak in the back, it didn't do much. Jak was on hi before the captain saw him move, the dark elf throwing him over his shoulder with no effort at all, the man hit the wall and didn't get back up.

Jak whipped out a long nosed barrel and snapped on a huge bulking attachment that blossomed out into an oval shape, he wanted to end the battle with as little casualties as possible, jumping and ducking into the centre of the room he radioed through to Torn to keep his men away fro the embassy. Reaching the centre and pointing the gun at the ground he looked around, letting all the lurkers and men come cloesr to him, then he fired.

Lines of green spread out from the point of origin like ripples i water, everything it touched was lifted off the ground and dangled in the air, unable to move, Jak walked around the room and surveyed the damage, many bodies in the air wouldn't have moved if they could, many dead in not much time. He called to Torn who had reached the ther side of the door to come through. The true FL grabbed the intruders and bound them, making sure there was no escape, then set about chatching the lurkers as they fell.

Jak, now returning to his usual form, strode up to the now awakening captain he had knocked out earlier, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck with one hand and lifting him up against the wall.

"Why are you attacking me and Haven's allies?" He growled, both casual and menacing. "You never stood a chance, it was barely a training session." He winced as he suddenly found spittle in his eye.

Torn took this as the last straw, jamming the butt of his rifle into the captain's head. "If I was you, I'd be begging for my life by now, not asking to be killed."

"It won't make a difference if I beg or not," Said the apparently suicidal traitor. "You think I didn't know I was going to die when I took this job, I've done what I came here to do."

"You've done nothing, all the lurkers that died here today can be saved by Keira."

"Look around you, we came dressed as guards for a reason, now the lurkers think you tried to kill them, they'll never agree to your plan. And when you get back, our masters will be free to kill you at their leisure."

"That where you wrong stupid man, we lurkers trust friend Jak and fight for him, you do nothing here today." Said a nearby lurker and raised his fistto the air, letting loose a ferocious roar.

Jak had heard enough, he pulled out a customised red pistol and blew the traitor's head off.

While Brutter stayed to tell the lurkers the full story, Jak went over to where Keira was tending to the wounded.

"Hey, how's this guy doin'." He asked her.

"He's gonna be fine, but there's a lot of lurkers here who could have done without the pain, I can't heal the wounds fully, many will never fight again." How are you though, I hear you got a bit angry?"

"I'm fine, I don't need anything." Snapped Jak, suddenly very protective.

Keira got suspicious. "Jak, you have been venting regularly havn't you?"

"Yes, every week, like Shorine said."

"JAK! You can't sneak a lie past your wife, I told you, Shorine told you, Daddy told you, and Damas would tell you as well if he were here." Jak winced at the sound of his dead father's name. "If you don't vent then it'll be like back in the prison, when you could barely stop yourself from killing one of your best friends. What if you just snap sometime and kill someone, like me, you don't want that do you?"

Jak didn't answer, but Keira got the gist. Torn called over to Jak, very confused.

"Jak, we got a problem, the lurkers want to get revenge on the ones who killed their brothers, but we can't just let them kill all these men, what are we gonna do with them?"

Jak thought for a minute, then got a brinwave.

"Say Torn," he said in a stage whisper, "Didn't we pass some rock just a little way back, a mile within the storm probability range, why don't we go back there and drop off some unwanted waste?"

Shivers ran through the crowd. "Unless of course some people would rather spend their time in a nice' safe prison cell." Vigorous nods. "Good, I'll radio for a transport, I hear they have lovely padded cells for those who misbehave, and if that doesn't work, we can send the perpetrators to Kras jail."

That did it, no one wanted to go to Kras jail, there were stories of people being eaten in there. With that sorted out Jak went to take care of business, they were nearing the storm.

Jak had spent hours organising all the exact positoins of each and every one of the troopers, he and Eiun were the only fliers capable of flight in harsh conditions, so all the rest had to use lurker balloons. The storm they were nearing was one of the largest on record, yellow eco from Dei Dailan Ok Eco had been mixed in with the dark, making a sheer barrier of dark flame that they would have to pass through. Jak had gone over the plan a hundred times with Eiun but he still explained it to the inexperienced captain, leaving no room for mistakes, Keira was on hold in case anyone faltered. The entire group of sages had put all their power into creating a magnifier for her power, making her able to heal wounds from miles away. Shorine had taken up a position at the top of the network of balloons, Eiun had taken his place at the back, and Jak was set up at the front.

Jak flew up to the front to get a good look at the storm, it was less than a kilometer away, he started off the network by sending a string of pure light eco to the nearest trooper, then he sent it to another, and eventually there was a web of light projected over the fleet, then for maximum protection the lines grew thicker, sheets of shining blue spreading out from the sides, forming a mushroom over the ships, protection everywhere, except the front, where Jak was.

It was four hours into the journey, Jak's plan was holding, and only one trooper had had to be healed so far, they had rested for a while in the eye, but it didn't last long, they were soon back into the fray, they had encountered some things that Jak recognised as vulture creatures from the old records, thankfully they were blind from flying all their life in an eco storm. Jak had reverted to Dark long ago, and was now being held up by most of the other troopers with their levitation powers, Keira watched anxiously from below, he hadn't had this much eco put in him since the Baron's time, he could crack at any minute.

There was a concentration point coming up, this was where an experimental ship that claimed to be able to withstand the storm went down, it was a swirling vortex of eco created when over landmass, this one was reported to have been swirling for over fifty years, it was going to be the hardest part.

Jak could see it most clearly, but his primitive dark eco clouded mind didn't realise what it was, and was therefore unable to make the necessary preperations, and when it hit, he couldn't do anything about it.

The eco ripped through his body, tearing at his flesh, scorching it, lightning playng over is limbs, Keira screamed and ran to the end of the ship nearest to him, if he fell not only would the net fail, but the eco in the water would kill him instantly. She didn't even know what she was doing, she just stood back from the railing, took a run at it, and jumped.

For the onlookers that day it would have seemed like an angel appeared, wings sprouted from her back and her body lit up in blue-white brilliance, eyes turning pure white. She didn't even acknowledge that anything had happened, her only thought was to get to Jak, his body was slipping, the troopers couldn't hold his body as the storm commanded that it be taken, their concentration slipped for a second, and his body fell, right into Keira's arms. Her light form brought him back to normal, he could now realise what was happening, but even his incredible mind couldn't fathom the beautiful creature holding him, he just knew it was Keira deep in his mind, but he just didn't know he knew.

The eco in his own body reared up again, his form returning to light, flying up to the helm with Keira at his side, he held the storm back, the net had flickered for a second while he was gone, but only for a second, now the troopers had seized control again, it was only a few minutes until they were clear of the clouds, but it would be the point when they died if they didn't get their at together, Jak and Keira stood at the front, hand in hand, and pushed, their power seeming to force the fleet to go faster, they were almost through, the eco outside the sheild couldn't even come within a dozen metres, Jak looked up just as they broke through, and saw the green sun.

Jak and Keira were recovering from their ordeal, after the storm had passed Shorine took a look at Keira, and revealed that being around Jak a lot had unintentionally transferred some of his powers into her body, making her capable of all the things he was. Daxter raised the question that if Keira had them then he might as well, he then grew small white angel feathers from his back that were barely able of making him hover three inches off the ground, much to everyone's amusement.

Sightings from several fly-overs in ragles reported that there was more activity around the northern half of the archipelago, meaning that Haven had to contend with the main force. Daxter, who had sat in the shadows finally decided to enter the battle, nominating himself to be part of Jak's personal guard, this guard consisted of Daxter, Jasen, Keira, and seven other big army names.

Jak had thought out his plan, Haven would first send in hellcats, blasting all vulture creatures to peices, then the bomb-bots would enter, blowing apart the big creatures, then tanks would quickly follow, and finally an unstoppable wave of troopers would set up camps at the many old Mamoron bases, gaining a foothold to lead a crusade to liberate the rest.

Jak stood at the front of the flagship, watching the island grow closer and closer, Seem came up behind him, he had been silent for a long time.

"What troubles you hero?"

"I can't help feeling that there's something else to this, something familiar."

"Maybe it is because you fought these monsters before, when you defeated Gol and Maia, the old records say that such beings came out of the silos at the final battle."

"No, it's more than that, it's elusive, and malicious, these things have no minds, they're driven only by their lust for eco, something else is controlling their movements, it's no coincidence that the largest concentration of them is where we, their biggest threat, plan to attack."

"Maybe, but it is sure to be nothing of a threat to you, you have faced the glory of the lurker armys, you held back the Barons forces in Haven with one hand, and annialated the metal-heads with the other, you were sent into the wasteland for treason, yet you still managed to save the world with minimum loss of life, you even took on the streets of Kras city single handedly, whatever your feeling is, you can handle it." Reassured the monk.

"Hey Jak, what's up." Said Daxter, bounding up onto Jak's shoulder guard. "Hey Seem, how ya doin' still look and sound like a complete weirdo eh?" Jak rolled his eyes then laughed as Daxter jerked off his shoulder as the ship ran aground, many hundreds of hellcats flew from platforms all over the fleet, bomb-bots were readied for battle, and all the regiments cocked their guns, making an noise that all the creatures in a ten mile radius would hear, Jak's guard gathered behind him, Keira put a hand on his shoulder. "Come on Jak, this is it." And the entire army moved out.

Jak and Keira burst through the foliage, swiftly followed by Daxter and Jasen, the rest of his guard had either become seperated or torn apart, they had run into several mage creatures, which were the eco creature's version of sages, and one of them was too strong, so they had to retreat, with the mage following. It jumped through the leaves after them, raising its hands to build up an eco blast, Jak took out the Sword of Freedom and slammed it into the monster's leg, cutting it clean off, the thing just laughed, and pointed to its severed leg as the flesh replaced itself, growing an entirely new leg in less the ten seconds.

It took out its own jagged blade and slashed at Keira, who only just ducked in time, Jasen leapt onto the mage's back and attempted to jab it into the creature's head, but heavy armour stopped it dead, but the distraction of a ninty kilo man on its back stopped the mage in it's tracks, giving Jak time to take out his light eco hgun, which had been a gift from the precursors when he went into their ship, and blasted the thing in the stomach, it seemed to explode in front of his, diluted dark eco spattering Jasen and Keira, thankfully they both had substantial protection. Jak put his ear to the ground and listened, Torn had radioed that no one had seen the demon creature yet, but it was sighted by the fly-overs before the battle, and Jak certainly didn't want to be caught off guard, nothing but the light patter of troops.

In the first hour of the battle Haven's forces had managed to seize control of six old Mamoron bases, finding many weapons and equipment inside, but the discovery of a new kind of creature set them back slightly. It was dubbed a tortured creature because it reminded witnesses of Jak when he was in dark mode, and had obviously been injected slowly with dark eco, making them stronger and faster, thankfully they were far less experienced with their powers and were easily brought down by Jak's own. Keira had got what she wanted and managed to get some fighting to herself, even though it was only with a tiger creature.

"Come on, we need to get moving." Said Jak, who unlike the rest, wasn't even breathing hard.

"Just one little rest, can't do much harm, I think I'll just lie down here and rest." Croaked Daxter.

"Yeah, just lie down and let that thing come and step on you." Said Keira. "If I see it I'll give it directions to you."

"We need to go now, those tortured creatures are causing havoc among the trops, and only me, you, and Eiun can take them out, not everyone hass eco powers you know."

"Sir, we can't go on, I've been in Chairen for three years, I'm pretty out of shape." Muttered Jasen. "and besides, those things havn't been spotted much, it takes a long time to pump enough eco into them to make them like that, so there's not too many."

"Well Keira, you coming, this is what it's like on a battlefield, if you think you can't handle it then just say and I'll call for someone to pick you up." Smirked the tall hero, who got a look from Keira that equalled Razer's death stare.

"If I couldn't handle it then I wouldn't be here, Daxter get your lazy ass off the ground and get moving, Jasen you do the same, and since I'm now officially higher than you, that's an order."

She was just about to go through the bushes when there was a rustling, all guns pointed to the sound, it was coming closer, something was coming towards them, they could now see an outline, it was parting the branches, comig out.

And there stood Samos, looking confused and dazed, Keira was overwhelmed with joy, throwing down her gun she grabbed her father in a bear hug, holding him so tightlyy she nearly blocked his air-pipe, letting go as she heard him begin to choke.

"Daddy where have you been, I was worried to death?"

"I don't remember, I only recall being dropped off from some precursor robot, someone held me prisoner, and I remember seeing a citadel, not unlike Gol and Maia's, nothing more than that."

Keira didn't care, she had her father back, that was all that mattered.

Karena staggered into a clearing, she could hear the sounds of battle all around her, her arm was bleeding haevily, and she had lost her gun a long way back. She now had no protection but her sword, which was as good as nothing, she almost had no will to live anyway, evr since Maealan's death she hadn't wanted to go on anymore, not only did she like him, but it was, in her mind, her fault he was dead.

A sound from behind her made her twist around to see a tiger creature staring back at her, then another appeared at it's side, then another behind her again, more kept coming all around her until she was surrounded. Nothing could stop this many, she closed her eyes, and accepted the inevitable.

And she heard a shot, and a thump as something hit the ground, then another, and another, ahe opened her eyes gingerly, and saw the bodies of the creatures already dissolving form touching light eco, she felt a hand on her shoulder, and she looked over her shoulder.

It was Maealan, alive and well and wearing the robes of a white monk, without thinking she spun around and pressed her face to his, even he wasn't surprised by the kiss.

She broke it to say. "I thought you were dead, how did you survive the fll, and keep away fro the monsters?"

"Well I've fallen off my ragle often enough to be able to withstand a puny fall like that, and as for the monsters, well...putit this way, if there are dark eco creatures, then it stands to reason that there would be light eco ceatures too, they found me and kept me safe, they've been fighting over control of the islands for as long as even they can remember, now that your army is here, they've managed to turn the tide, they already destroyed to demon and most of the high ranking mages, your side has won the battle for them."

"Well tell them we're glad to help." She giggled, before kissing him again. The comm. unit on her belt bagan to buzz and Torn's voice appeared.

"Calling all units, we have been sucessful in liberating the islands, and there appear to be other creatures on the islands, creatures of light, all enemy forces have been routed, good job people.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well that's my longest chapter yet, hope you liked it, it took me a long time to write, now that we have Maealan back that pretty much sets the scene for chapter fourteen, which is going to be my last, seeya in thirteen guys.


	13. Chapter 13: the light army

THEMAKEROFLIGHT:  I apologise for the shitty font, my dads computer is slightly different from mine. Anyway, on with the show, for the benefit of people who can't just assume, the light eco creatures look like light jak.

CHAPTER 13: THE LIGHT ARMY

Samos had spent most of the week living it up in a luxury apartment, milking his amnesia for every little titbit it could give him. Keira and Jak still hadn't got round to telling him they were already married, each were dreading it, he had insisted he be there for it, or else. Jak didn't particularly want to find out what 'else' was.

The light army, after explaining their position in political matters, had dissapeared back to the vast caverns of eco below the islands, making it very clear that only Jak, Keira and Maealan were to be allowed into their city. Even after their help Torn still made preperations in case they turned ugly, Maealan had hen tried to give him a once over about being so presumptous, he didn't get far before he looked like he was staring at a demon.

Jak's next priority was the Hora Dailan, which hadn't launched an attack since the last attack on Morien, over a month ago, their power noticed by it's abscence. The monsters in the east usually attacked once a week, only trouble could come out of such a death drout.

Jinx came striding into the Naughty Ottsel, his usual smugness and suave annoying everyone immediately, he saw Keira sitting alone by the counter, a can of beer in her hand.

"Hey there Keira, how ya doin'?" His nasal voice giving her an instant headache.

"I was fine, then you came in."

"Aaawwwww, don't say that, hey, you and Jak still together, or can I budge in and uuhh, you know?"

"You know, I'm reassured by the fact that Jak will rip your arms off your body if you come anywhere near me, not to mention Sig, Daddy, Torn, Maealan, Jasen, and most of the city for that matter."

"You look down on your luck, what's eatin' ya?"

"It's this army that we ran into, I feel something familiar in it, I still can't place it, Jak gets the same thing." She reached for a bottle of Punner on the other side of the counter.

Uuuuhhhh, Keira, I wouldn't drink that if I were you, it's strong, real strong, seriously don't drink. DON'T DRINK!" Too late, she swigged it down and looked at him rather boredly.

"I've tasted stronger." And she walked out leaving Jinx staring at the bottle.

"It must be a set up, must be, glug ooohhh god no it's not, Jesus that thing stings.

Keira turned out of the slide doors and began to walk to the race stadium, a good race always calmed her nerves. She was walking through the gardens when she saw something, just a light in the directon of the south forest, no one had been in there since Jak had awoken the communication device, they all seemed to revere it as a way to talk to the stars. She found it strange that someone would want to do it without Jak, who was off riding with the ragles (A/N, some people have asked me about the ragles, they are evolved forms of flut fluts, they are capable of flight for hours and are almost as smart as humans.), so she went to investigate.

The young mechanic stepped through the airlock and into the forest, she could see the pillars in the center of the basin, a glowing purple light at it's pinnacle, she recognised it as the colour of dark eco. She hopped behind a rock to protect herself, knowing that if it was an eco creature that she was no match for it without a gun. Risking a peek she poked her head out, and saw what it was, a huge dark eco crystal was sat a the top of the comm device, the darkness was already eating away at the precursor metal, soon it would be completely destroyed.

She ran out from her hiding place, no longer caring if she was seen, if their only way of talking to the precursors was broken, then they would be sitting ducks for any dark maker ships that were passing. She jumped onto the first platform, pulling herself up to the next, and then the next, peices of metal were falling from the top, she had to dodge the falling quantum reflector. Upon reaching the top she hesitated, if there were any creatures still around hen the explosion would attract them, and she couldn't push it into the water because the forest supplied most of Haven's drinking water.

She decided to risk the explosion, taking out her Bronco B36 cutting hammer, she gasped in the cold heat from the crystal, coming close to it was already burning her. Braving a little closer she swung the pliers over her head and hefted it into the heart of the purple rock, it began to glow brighter and brighter, cracks appeared from the point of the pliers contact, spreading deep into the crystal, as soon as they reached the center it would blow. Keira got back down onto the nearest pillar, crawling away from the natural bomb, here eco burns slowing her down.

The cracks began to shine along the edge of the crystal, then a splitting sound caused Keira to look up, and then scream, as a wave of purple electricity exploded from the crystal, she was hit head on by the shockwave. It knocked her off the platform and into the water, she was breathing in eco from the infected water, but some instict told her to become light, she did so, and rose out of the water, unconcious, but alright.

Unfortunately the sudden surge of light caused two hooded figures to look round. Evil smiles spread across their warped faces, they couldn't beleive their luck, now they could kill two yakows with one eco bomb. They had come to stop any communication between the city and the precursors, just in case they were found out earlier than planned, now they could capture the girl, and lure Jak to his death.

They glided over to the suspended girl and reached out, but the light emanating from her body burned them.

"AH!" Exclaimed the first one. "Curse this girl, she will get her treatment all the worse for that."

"Patience my brother, we don't want the hero to see her harmed. The simple threat of it will be enough, and she won't give us any pleasure anyway, she's too_ courageous_ for that."

"she'll run out of power eventualy, she's not as powerful as he is, we just have to wait, and then, we will have our revenge."

Jak practically skipped down the corridor to Keira's room, he was always exhilirated by his rides on ragles, such power wasn't to be wasted, and he certainly didn't.

He chaped on the wood oak door, no answer. "Keira!" He called. "You there? The council needs you for some sort of announcement, or ribbon cutting or some shit like that." Still no answer, he opened the door, strangely it was ajar, after Jinx walking in on her while she was changing she always kept it locked. Inside there were trophies and medals and pictures of back in Sandover, but no Keira.

He saw a note on her bed, probably some lame explanation about how she was feeling to down to do queenly duties. Snatched off the quilt, barely glancing at it. But something on it caught his eye, the signature, not her's, he looked at it more carefully, his eyes widenng in shock, he read it through quickly, then ran from the room, sprinting down the hallway to look for someone, anyone, for on the note, the signature read 'Gol Acheron, and Maia Acheron.'

A thorough search of the forest had told phorensics all they needed to know, thankfully, the main part of the communicator had survived, but both te quantum reflector and the holo cube were missing, meaning they still couldn't contact the 'cursors until they found replacements.

Jak didn't particularly care about it though, he just wanted to know if they had found any evidence on where they had taken her, the boys were happy to oblige.

"It was quite a challenge I must say, more than we usually get eh guys?" Blabbered the scientist, and got a hearty response from his comrades. "Yeah it was hard but we got through it, after all we are the best company in town for this sort of thing, of course we are the only one in the city but that's neither her nor..."

"WOULD YOU GET TO THE POINT MAN! MY WIFE COULD BE OUT THERE DIEING, AND IF YOU DON'T HELP ME FIND HER i'LL HAVE YOU ASS NAILED TO A WALL!" Thundered Jak, the constant blabbing driving him up the wall. A strand of dark eco shot out of his body and actually zapped the man's finger, making him yelp and leap back.

"V-very well, we found a t-trail of eco leading o-over the sheild wall and straight north, t-towards that citadel that was supposedly lived in by Gol and Maia." Then he relaxed into his usual banter again. "Of course that was just an ancient myth, Gol and Maia probably lived somewhere else, people just accociated it with them cos they came from the north.

"That was where they lived."

"I beleive you are mistaken s..."

"Look here brain box, you may think you're smart cos of your damn GCSEs, but you make yourself stupid by choosing to ignore those who were there at certain events and instead listening to your misinformed books. So for your benefit, I'll put it bluntly, I was there, the legend tells of a light warrior who defeated them, that was me, I fought my way from Sandover all the way up to their citadel, and destroyed their robot, so I think you should shut up, and listen.

The man hid behind his clipboard and nodded to show he was listening.

"Good, now I want you to take this message to Torn, or if you can't find him, Maealan, and inform Shorine and Samos, they still haven't been told. Now, Torn is to lead a squadron of hellcats to the snowy mountain 100 miles north, from there we can invade the citadel from the bottom up, the zoomer team can transport people to the yellow sage's old lab, got it.

Another nod.

"Well get away then, no time to waste in war you idiot.

The now paranoid phorensist ran away to spread the news to the main commanders, leaving Jak to start trekking over the landscape, if he could make it to what used to be Rock Village, then he could pick up transport from the villagers, and hopefully get there at the same time as Torn.

Stumbling through the burning houses Jak looked mortified. What was left of Rock Village was now no more than smouldering ashes, dark eco firse still burned in piles of dead bodies.

High above him he could see the first units in the armada begin to pass overhead, he waved to catch their attention, there wasn't anything rideable in this town. No good, they were too high, he looked for something to wave, there was nothing in sight. He gave up the search and summoned his light energy, making a line of light pointing to the sky, it worked. The lead hellcat turned and descended into the center of the old stronghold, Torn, Ashelin, and most of the Sages stepped out of the extra big ship.

"Jak, what happened here?" Asked Mosen, who had been this village's sage in the past.

"I dunno, I only just got here, we must have just missed the attackers, the fires are still burning."

"Well let's not stand around chatting, you have a daughter to save, or else" Said Samos with a threatening glare at Jak, who decided to let it lie and hurry up with saving his wife, he climbed into the cockpit, yanked the controls from the pilot.

"Ladies and gentlemen your regular pilot is not as good as me, so hold on to your hats, and if any of you ate any lunch today, well...you have only yourself to blame." After a chorus of groans from the back Jak fired up the engines. The heavy load being lifted off the ground like a feather, the cruiser shot over landscapes high and low, towards the looming presence, of Gol and Maia's citadel.

Low in the depths of the lava tube the entire group stood, all the men had made it through without too much bother, and were now standing guard at the door, making sure no one could come through without becoming a human fireplace.

"Alright, who's going in, we need a head count." Shouted Torn, all of the names we know stepped forward, but not a single soldier was brave enough.

"Come on, we're fighting for our queen here, I want volunteers." Still nothing.

"OK, anyone who steps forward, gets a manditory promotion, the rest get demoted." This time everyone stepped forward. "Good, now that you've put yourselves forward, I can tell you that the promotions were a lie, but lucky for you, the demotions weren't."

The troopers brought up a great battering ram to break through the door, the swung it practitionally, counted to three, and rammed the metal log into the door. But before it touched the seal, the iris opened, sending the carriers flying through with the momentum.

"Really damn sloppy guys, really damn sloppy." Chuckled Jak, and stepped over the groaning men, striding down the hallway into the main hall, it was relatively the same as before, except te cages had been removed, and instead of lurkers, eco creatures patrolled the platforms, strangely, they weren't attacking.

"Ahh, my dear Jak, I knew you'd turn up sooner oor later, or in this case later." Said a voice from above them, Jak turned to see Gol floating above the door with Maia at his side.

"Where the hell is Jak's wife you eco sucking bad excuse for a sage." Said Karena.

"Oohh, did you hear that brother, this imputent little brat is the one who tried to steal your thunder, and she says that you're the stooge." Snickered Maia.

"Now Jak, and collective idiots, you'd better be nice, or you won't get to see the prise of you efforts, just look there." Gol pointed to the central portal, and everyone looked to see Keira, suspended on a wire above the abyss below.

"Let her go you...thing!" Shouted Jak, making a gesture at Gol.

"Let her go? Now why didn't we think of that, ohh Sakken, let the prisoner go." The tortured creature at the top grinned, and let go of the rope.

"NO!" Cried Jak.

"Very well." Said Gol, and she stopped falling, still hanging, but considerably more shaken. "Here is how you are going to work, we will summon our champion, and he will face yours, the winner gets to have the girl, deal?" The group nodded. "Good, SAKKEN!"

The aforementioned creature leapt down directly in front of Jak, his firey eyes burning with pain induced hatred for both Jak, and the twins.

"No use prolonging your defeat, let's begin." Jak shook himself, trying to get his muscles working after a long stretch of sitting in the cockpit. He drew his sword, and his oponent did so too.

Circling each other, locked in the other's gaze they turned their weapons, slashing the air to get in the mood. The creature leapt into the middle, slamming his blade down onto Jak's, who parried and swung the sword to the side, making his enemy's fly to the side, he then tried to jab his blade into the thing's chest, but it grabbed the hilt and twisted it away. It drew a smaller dagger from it's belt, jabbing down at the hero's face, but just in time some clever troopers shot it out of the tortured man's hand, the jagged dagger spinning away over the edge.

Jak ducked to avoid a spinning attack from his adversary, he knew he could go on fighting for hours and no one would win, he needed to find a new tactic, something Gol and Maia wouldn't have thought of, something brilliant from that tactical mind. Then it came to him, he ducked and weaved between the creatore's flailing arms, gabbed the arm holding it's blade, and with his now glowing right hand he held steadfastly to Sakken's face, his power flowed from his body to the tortured man he was holding. Before the twins could do anything he began to change, his skin lost it's purple hue and returned to the norm, the spines up and down his arms retracted into his flesh, and his eyes, those hate filled eyes that had sen much suffering, now showed sorrow, not for himself, but for all the men and women he had killed during his slavery.

Jak dropped him to the ground and sank to his knees, the effort to change the very nature of one's mind and body was immense. The former dark warrior looked around, his clouded mind remembering where he was, and then he looked to the angry figures floating above him.

"You cheated!" Yelled Gol. "The game is null and void, and now you shall see your wife die, prepare..."

He got no further as Sakken leapt up the their height, the old remains of the dark eco super-charging his muscles, he clasped Gol's arm and leg, holding for dear life, the old hate in his eyes again, but for his torturers this time.

"Wha...what are you doing?"

"You forced me to go through terrible things, and now you want to kill the man who freed me, I won't let you." Shouted Sakken, his bravery giving Jak time to turn into Light, and fly to Keira's dangling point, the wire snapped easily, having been there for centuries. He flew her back to the front platform, and told them to go back to the lab and get away, then he turned back to Sakken.

"Come." He spoke, his ethereal voice calming the man's nerves.

"If I let go then he'll get you and the others." Replied Sakken, who seemed strangely unshaken by Gol's attempts to throw him off. "I don't even know your name, yet you saved me, and thenks to that, I shall die a man." He then looked back up to the former sage, fire burning in his heart, he jumped to the spiny body of the warped man, stabbing him with what was left of his claws, the dark eco in his body sating Gol's senses, making them less potent. Jak didn't have to stay to know the outcome, it was that brave man's choice to save some people he had never known, and he would be remembered for it.

Maealan and Karena wandered into the Freedom Tower control room and found Jak sulking in a cushioned chair, still in a mood about the council's decision not to give Sakken a proper funeral or memorial, they claimed he was both a traitor and a murderer.

"Hey Jak." Said Maealan. "Come on, you can't sulk forever, we need you for other things, like the city's protection for instance."

"And what if I want to sulk, I did all the fighting for everyone else for the last few years, I think I've earned some personal time to sulk."

"Well there's some hooded guy outside wanting to see you, he says to tell you he can help balance the war." Karena said, not expecting much reaction, she got more than she bargained for, buncing up from his seat Jak shot out the door and into the elevator, it only took a few seconds to get down in the hyper vator, he jogged out of the door and saw the man Karena had mentioned.

"I greet you great balanced one, I am Illumi, I am here to help you."

Jak stared at the man, he could feel a power emanating from his body, the power of light. He stepped forward to speak more privately to the man.

"Who are you, and how can you help us?" He whispered, not wanting to be overheard by any passer-bys.

"I can control what you call the dark army, and give you power to kill the dark animals as well."

"How, not even the precursors could control the eco creatures or metal-heads."

"The precursors did not create eco, and they can therefore never fully understand it, but we can, we can use our power to directly counteract the power of our enemies."

"And you still haven't answered my first question fully, who are you?"

"I? I am that who balances, I am of the light, I am the illumination, in short, I am the commander of the light army." As soon as he said the words people began to form behind him, glowing figures of light, thousands appearing out of the air, each one looked ready for battle, the men and women in the area looked around them as the were surrounded by shining warriors. Before them, was the light army.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well there you go, how was that, did you like it, cos if you did, REVIEW! Serously, I have about 700 hits and only six reviews, I need more, but those who have reviewed are appreciated, thank you, and goodnight.


	14. Chapter 14: hora daecas

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: hey guys, well, this is the last chapter, but don't worry, I'll be doing two sequels. Thanks for the few reviews I got in the short time the story was up, I just got another.

_theagent:_ thanks agent, you'll get to see the warriors in action in this chapter, but not much I'm afraid, you may see them more in the next book, but that's all I'm giving away for now.

Now then. on with the show.

CHAPTER 14: HORA DAECAS

The huge hulking shadow of the free ship descended down on the huge landing platforms set up on the main island, it had been used to transport most of the forces and all of the light army from Haven. Jak had made a treaty with all Haven's old enemies, Duntus, Durancas city, and even Manaras had been drafted in to help with the invasion of the Hora Dailan. He planned to do the same sort of thing as with the islands, spread out and travel across the land killing all in the path of the alliance. Their main target was the Hora Daecas (A/N Horror City), the main station in the land, where the new leader, Kallas, would be residing.

Kallas was the leader of the metal heads now that both Errol and Kor had been killed, he was a monstrous metal-pede of great intelligence and strength, who had seized power from the old leader not a week ago, apparently that battle was what the metal-heads had been so preoccupied with the last few days.

Keira and Jak strode out of the doors with Illumi gliding along behind them, then most of the main characters jostled out too, except for Sig, Seem, and most of the sages, who had decided to take the Spargus ship to their part of the islands, but Samos and Shorine had wanted to come with their daughter and son-in-law.

Jak yelled at Daxter, who was falling behind in the group, and was in danger of being trampled. "Hurry up Dax, you don't wanna end up ottsel pie do you?"

"HEY! That precursor pie to you buster!" He yelled indignantly, being very sensitive about his being called a precursor, not an ottsel, Jak chuckled and bent down to let his friend up on his shoulder.

Jak, Keira, Samos, Shorine, Karena and Maealan went through a pair of doors to the main planning room, leaving Torn and Ashelin to deal with the democrats.

"Uuhh my aching bones." Grumbled Samos. "I'll be glad to get past this business and get on with what matters, and then we can hurry along with that wedding of yours Jak." Jak and Keira shared a guilty look, it was finally time to tell him.

"Uuuhhh, Daddy...we have, some...news about that."

"What news." The sage said, a tone building in his voice.

"Well...news, about the wedding...we...kinda...had it...already" Jak finished akwardly, holding his breath for the explosion from his father-in-law.

"Well then, that's...unexpected, but I think I can live with it, possibly. " Jak didn't buy the calm act, Samos was holding something back, he wasn't as happy with the news as he said.

"Samos. You are OK with this, right?"

"Of course I am Jak, why wouldn't I be?" He was getting a bit riled up now, trying to hold back his anger.

"Daddy, I've know you for all my life, you are sooooo not OK with this." Samos finally broke.

"FINE FINE, SO I'M NOT OK, I HATE MISSING MY OWN DAUGHTER'S WEDDING, WHY WOULDN'T I, IT'S MY WORST NIGHTMARE, I MISS..." He was cut off by Shorine and keira.

"Daddy it's alright."

"Yes Samos, it'll be fine, Keira doesn't mind obviously, and the only thing wrong with mising a wedding is if the person minds."

"And if you're still anxious we could even re-do the wedding in a while, Maealan wasn't there either so he might want to be there too." Put in Jak, and Keira heartily agreed, she had enjoyed the wedding immensely, and would definately like to do it again, unfortunately Jak was bluffing, and it paid off.

"Aahhh, very well, but I'm not completely satisfied mind!" Keira hugged him suffocatingly, squeezing the life out of his short frame.

"Thank you Daddy, thank you so much, we don't blame you for missing it."

"I get it, now let's get on with the planning, we've got a lot to do."

Flying over the beautiful but deadly landscape of Illian in a was the royal transport, carrying jak and Keira to the capital of the country, also called Illian. Jak was going there to talk with it's king, Warlen, who had recently declined to become part of the alliance, because of it's age-old rivalry with it's northern neighbor, Morien, who had agreed.

The giant ship came down on the articulate twists and turns of the large fishing city. It had no defence walls, relying on it's more heavily defended cities further in shore to protect it, the lack of weapons and walls made the city more majestic, Keira thought.

Jak stepped off the ramp into the huge holding station of the capital, Warlen himself had come to meet the king. The whole of Illian owed Jak their lives, the metal-heads were just about to break through their closest city's defences when Jak killed Kor, making the creatures back off, saving the people of the large country, because of this they held him in high regard, despite his fraternising with Morien.

"King Jak." Said Warlen, his large crown that drew everyone's attention to him wobbling slightly. "It is an honor to meet you in person, and I was surprised that you would want to come here to see this small, unimportant country."

"Save your bootlicking for someone who cares, you know full well what I'm here for, so let's stop with the formalities and get on with it." Jak didn't like Warlen, he was always an pathetic king who only made it up to that level by killing his two older brothers, and sending his father on a suicide mission to a nearby metal-head nest.

"Of course my leige, right this way." The royal guard led the three down long passageways deep underground to the king's complex. It was placed underground because Warlen was always afraid that Morien would bomb the city, and he wanted to be as far away from them as possible.

"I don't want to intrude, but why bring your wife here? I always find that women are useless when it comes to political matters."

"I find her advice very good, and your opinion is probably why you still haven't been able to find a wife yourself."

"Plus the fact that you're a complete sexist twat!" Yelled Keira, who had never appreciated being patronised.

"I apologise my lady, although I wasn't talking to you was I?" Said the stupid king, not knowing what anger he had just awoken.

"DON'T PRESUME TO TALK TO HER LIKE THAT! I told you what I feel about her inputs and you would do well to take that onboard!" Jak grabbed the man and shook him to make sure he wouldn't make the mistake again.

"Y-yes sir. Sorry sir." He stuttered, being very stupid and saying it to Jak, still ignoring the young woman sitting next to him.

"Well, you would also do well to apologise to the person you were rude to, not to her husband you shit!" Keira doing the same as Jak and holding the man by the collar.

"That's enough _pleasantries _for now, to business, we want you to become part of the alliance, we need as many countries as possible, and Illian's friendship has always been important to us as a city." Said Jak, making strong eye contact with the man sitting opposite, who immediately broke it.

"We will not enter into a treaty that has Morien's signature on it, those bastards have always hated and attacked us, we refuse."

"I would strongly advise you to agree with me. Morien's government has already signed and agreed to let bygones be bygones with you."

"It's a trick, Morien are sneaky people, you can't trust them."

"In my opinion," said Keira, "You're the one that can't be trusted, records that we aquired show that Morien hasn't led an assault or raid on your borders for fifty years, yet you continue to attack their cities and kill their people, and yet they value you joining so much that they still agree to help you."

"That's a lie!" He shouted, standing up and suddenly looking not threatening, but a strong attempt at it. "Morien was never a worthy friend. I do not appreciate being spoken to in my city, get out of my halls, NOW!"

Jak stood up himself, and talked quietly to the failing king.

"Look around you Warlen, I'm held as a hero by the people, whereas you're held as a murderer and usurper of the throne, not too good a position to be in when planning a war that the astablishment doesn't particularly want to get into, don't you think?"

The colour drained from Warlen's face, he sat down and looked rather sick at the thought of losing his prised throne.

"Very well, I'll sign the damn treaty, but I'm not fighting in any wars!"

The short man stood up and summoned his guard, he gestured to the royal couple to go first. But as they walked past he made a flick of the hand to his men and they grabbed them from behind, handcuffing the two in seconds.

"And the ruse coes out." Cackled Warlen. "You see now what I planned, I know you want the crown of Illian, but you will not have it, I am the only ruler."

"You idiot. Jak doesn't want the bloody crown, he barely wants Haven's crown, all we want is peace throughout the world, no more war, and I'm sure your people want that too." Keira struggled in her captors grip, who smiled like he was enjoying her movements.

"Ahh, but what about I want, I want that lovely power that comes with ruling more land, and I can only get that through war. Take them away." But the traitorous king and his cohorts never got further than the door, a huge mass of free people surged through the doors and charged at the group of soldiers, who in turn swivelled to face the king, who was now looking decidedly scared.

Jak and Keira were quickly freed and stepped to the front of the mob, strangely they seemed reluctant to attack their oppressor, instead sheering back from him in what looked like fear.

"Why be scared of him?" Jak said the the crowd. "I mean, he's just a man, and barely that."

"My lord Jak Mar, it is written, that he who slays a king will be struck down in fire, we dare not touch him." Squeaked a man, who then retreated to the back of the pack.

"So you lot are too scared to kill him eh? I guess I'll have to do it myself." Jak stepped down the steps that the king was rapidly stumbling down. "You know Warlen, it was always gonna happen in the end, you can't be a bad king and expect to get away with it, look and Praxis, and Veger, both usurpers of power in the wrong place, and the wrong time, and, my not so friend, are no diferent."

With that sentence Jak brought the _Sword of Freedom_ down on the man's head, rending it from his neck and sending the ball spinning away down the steps. He then turned back to the townsfolk, and said. "So I'm cursed, like I care." And walked back to the transport, taking Keira with him. Before leaving Jak sorted out with the new king-to-be the matter of the treaty, who was happy to oblige, and then he was away over the treetops and mountains of Illian, back to his home.

Maealan and Karena sat doefully in the preperation room, they had received news from the islands not minutes ago. Alledgedly a prisoner had been taken in the islands shouting something about the dark mosters rising, obviously he meant the metal-heads, and was speedily being flown back to Haven for interrogation. Jak and Keira would be back any minute with news of the treaty, and both predicted that he wouldn't be happy to see the prisoner.

"At least he might be able to tell us something about the metal-heads plan, he may help us, even if not willingly." Said Maealan encouragingly, but Karena shook her head.

"No, if he had seen something he'd be dead, I imagine he simply saw metal-heads feeding on some poor soul and made assumatoions, he's that sort of person from what I heard."

Maealan sighed in agreement and kissed the woman next to him on the cheek, then they both looked up as the foghorn announced the arrival of a ship to the north, that would be Jak. And at the same time another went off to the south signalling the arrival of the prison transport.

"Uh oh, Jak is gonna be mmmaaa-ad when he sees this." And upon Maealan's words the man himself bounced into the room.

"Hey guys." He said cheerfully, then lost his smile as he saw the look on their faces. "Which evil villain has returned, what war's been started, and who died." He said quickly, trying to cover all the possible things that could have happened in one sentence.

"The first one." Said Karena.

"You're not gonna like this Jak." Warned Maealan.

Jak pushed through the doors into the landing facility, and there, in all his trouserless glory, was Veger.

"Vager you cunt, why don't you just die and do the world a favour."

"I will not be spoken to like that by you you animal, not in my state especially, somebody get me some ice here!" Yelled the pushy ottsel, struggling in the cuffs clearly too big for him.

"Look Veger, you're tied up, in a prison ship, standing in front of the man who's father you killed, who happens now to be the king of the city you're in, and still you're arrogance makes you think that you'll be served at you're every whim." Said Vin who had appeared on a screen inside the ship.

£Hey Vin, know where this little devil sprang from?"

"Affirmitive, he was found on one of the smaller and less eco-rich islands by Mamoron forces, who immediately recognised him from mugshots, and brought him to our troops, he's been making trouble all the way across, knawing at wires, biting technicians, he even temporarily shut down my audio receptors so the driver had to input the directions manually, gave us quite a scare."

"Sounds like he's due to be taught a lesson, he saw something out there, I wanna know what." Jak turned back to the preachy rat and picked him up by the fur.

"Now Veger, I'm gonna talk and you're gonna listen, the men who found you said you were talking some gibberish about the dark animals rising, what did you mean?"

"I don't know what I meant." Said the now serious former count. "I remember I saw something, but what, I don't know. I know it wasn't on the islands, I was dropped back there by a ship, but the trauma won't let me recall anything more, it was too horrible."

Jak had never seen the ottsel so distressed before, he had always remembered him as the overbearing character from his past that always thought he was better than everyone else, not a shivering wreck reminiscing about fearful times.

"Anyway, what business is it of yours? " Said Veger, returning to his usual self.

"That does it, I have a suitible punishment for you, since it seems we have to keep an eye on you constantly,I'm assigning you to the war, you'll fight in the battle when we reach the Hora Dailan, and you won't get upitty with your superiors, or there'll be punishments. Hope to see you on the frontlines, private Veger.

The great cloud of the eco storm finaly quieted, it's thundering power dissapating through it's exposure to light eco in the air away from Hora Dailan. Jak looked out over the shining surface of the Cataenas ocean, it's majestic beauty dawning on him for the first time, he had always thought of the sea as an obstacle, simply there to be surpassed, but now he was growing into his maturity, he saw it more as a fellow soul, the waters had seen so much war over it's shores, so much death from the storms that travelled over it's waves, it was like an old friend now, a comrade in war.

He was now on the great ship of Haven, it had been started over a year ago for the very purpose he was using it for now, to invade Hora Dailan once and for all. On board was the entire compliment of Haven's army, ready for battle.

Keira sidled up to him, and draped her arm over his shoulder, he was again standing at the helm and staring, he always did that when something was troubling him.

"What's wrong Jak?" She spoke quietly into his ear.

"You know what's wrong, you've been feeling it too for the last week, something building, more than Gol and Maia revealed at first." He replied, his young wife didn't say anything, but she understood what he meant, she could feel a wave building in her heart, something that hadn't surfaced since Sandover, something powerful.

Jak snapped his head up as the first peaks of the dark land were seen over the horizon, he lunged back into the cabins and walkways of the ship to tell Torn, soon the first effects of dark eco in the air would begin to seep into the soldiers, he ran through the quarters, shouting to the men to put their masks on before they suffocated, everyone obliged, dieing of dark eco poisoning was not pleasant.

Jak burst through the doors into the control room, he did't even have to tell the commander, who took his sudden appearance as a sign that it was time to turn on weapon, he walked over to the large green button on the main console, whispering something of a prayer before pressing it down.

Jak then jumped up into a shaft above, climbing up into the higher reaches of the ship, and through the roof to the high deck, and there before him, was Mar's gun, and huge light eco crystal stuck where the precursor stone would have gone, it was pointed towards the main wall of the land already, all that was left to do was for Jak to man it. The blonde hero climbed into the firing seat, and began scanning the great mountains for a weak spot, he found a low part of the rock wall that looked particularly weak, in fact it was already substantially damaged.

He switched the aiming mechanism on, firing up the gun for the first time since destroying the metal-head nest, swivling the nozzle to point to the weak spot, he edged his thumb over the button that would break through the wall, and calmly said, "Eat this!", before firing.

The rock exploded into the air, boulders the size of metal-pedes flying into the water, but strangely no sound of metal-heads came from the point of origin, nothing but the sound of the explosion, Jak thought this odd, but dismissed it as coincidence.

He jumped back down onto the poop deck, and met upp with those who had volunteered for his new guard, naturally Daxter and Keira had stepped up, but along with them was Maealan, who had Karena in tow, Eiun, Jasen, and Illumi had insisted on fighting alongside him also.

He leapt down into the landing dingy that had bee set up for him, and after the rest had come down too, he paddled for shore, the boats around him puuled away from the main ship too, running aground on the shore and leaping out into offensive stances

But there was nothing there, no metal-heads swarming over the mountains, no leapers flying down to impare them, not a solitary roar, nothing. Jak stepped forward to the edge of the gap, expecting to be pounced upon by monsters any second, but nothing came, again, there was silence, all but the whisperings of the soldiers behind him.

Ahead Jak could see the gates of Hora Daecas, the dark city that had killed any who were foolish or ignorant enough to set foot inside it's border, the great gates were broken, hanging on their enormous hinges that had been built by Kor himself. He cautiously stepped through the remains of the gate, and finaly saw what he had missed. Piles of metal-head bodies mounded all over the huge grounds of the city, eco fires burned in the piles just as they had in Rock Village. And in the centre, desecrated beyond words, was Kallas, the great leader of the metal-head army, his body scorched by what had obviously ben a demon, dead.

The army came through the doors after him, staring at the destruction and death, it took them a second, but then they broke into celebration, yelling and dancing at the passing of their greatest enemy. But Jak didn'y celebrate, he knew the truth, that the metal-heads, those who people said were indestructible, had been brought down by something worse, something far worse, the terror of Gol and Maia.

THEMAKEROFLIGHT: well, that's it, I have finally finished my first fanfic, I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope you will enjoy the sequel too, come with me, if you will, on a journey, with Jak, and all he holds dear, we will see him in situations that we all love to see him in, with the odds against him, fighting for his life.


End file.
